Speaker 1: You are listening to the IFAH podcast Network. For more
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Speaker 2: Welcome to the Bulletproof Screenwriting Podcast, Episode number three ninety six.
Speaker 2: We must learn to live together as brothers or paris
Speaker 2: together as fools. Martin Luther King broadcasting from a dark, windowless.
Speaker 1: Room in Hollywood when we really should be working on
Speaker 1: that next draft. It's the Bulletproof Screenwriting Podcast, showing you
Speaker 1: the craft and business of screenwriting while teaching you how
Speaker 1: to make your screenplay bulletproof.
Speaker 2: And here's your host, Alex Ferrari. Welcome, Welcome to another
Speaker 2: episode of the Bulletproof Screenwriting Podcast. I am your humble
Speaker 2: host Alex Ferrari. Now. Today's show is sponsored by Bulletproof
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Speaker 2: by professional readers, head on over to covermiscreenplay dot com. Now. Guys,
Speaker 2: today on the show, we had Ted sim from Indie
Speaker 2: Mogul and from Aperture Lighting. I've been wanting to get
Speaker 2: Ted on the show for quite some time, and we
Speaker 2: finally were able to coincide our schedules to make this happen.
Speaker 2: I've been a fan of Ted's and what he's doing
Speaker 2: at Aperture for a long time. I actually use almost
Speaker 2: exclusively Aperture lights when I was making on the Corner
Speaker 2: of Ego and Disney, and I just love what he's
Speaker 2: doing with not only Aperture, but now that he's part
Speaker 2: of the Indie Mogul family and was able to bring
Speaker 2: Indie Mogul kind of back to life with him and Griffin.
Speaker 2: I was so so excited to sit down and talk
Speaker 2: shop with him and see what's going on now. This
Speaker 2: was recorded pre COVID nineteen, so that is why you
Speaker 2: will not hear anything in regards to COVID nineteen. Was
Speaker 2: recorded a little bit before the shutdown. But I think
Speaker 2: you're going to enjoy this episode without any further ado.
Speaker 2: Please enjoy my conversation with Ted Sim. I'd like to
Speaker 2: welcome to the show, Ted Sim, the legendary Ted Sim.
Speaker 3: I don't know about legendary.
Speaker 2: Brother. Yo, holding up.
Speaker 3: Man, it was good man, doing good, hanging out, working
Speaker 3: on a bunch of stuff.
Speaker 4: Listen to that NIFILM podcast. Man, here we go.
Speaker 2: Yeah, baby, I mean, this is like I was saying earlier. Man,
Speaker 2: I think it's a long time coming. Man, it's it's uh.
Speaker 2: You know, I've been I've been a fan of yours
Speaker 2: for a while, been a fan of what you've been
Speaker 2: doing with Aperture and now with Indie Mogul and all
Speaker 2: the service that you're doing for the film community in general.
Speaker 3: Man.
Speaker 2: Because we're such a small group, there's not a lot
Speaker 2: of us doing what we do as far as trying
Speaker 2: to help the community and trying to be of service
Speaker 2: and all that stuff. And we all it's so funny
Speaker 2: if we don't know each other personally we know somebody
Speaker 2: who knows each other, and it's kind of like it
Speaker 2: kind of goes that way. So it's it's very it's
Speaker 2: but I've been wanting to get you on the show.
Speaker 2: I had Griffin on the show a while ago, which
Speaker 2: was so much fun, and it's so much.
Speaker 3: Fun, and he's seriously just that. You think he's a
Speaker 3: nice guy when you watch the videos and then you
Speaker 3: meet him or talk to him in person or online,
Speaker 3: and then you're like, oh my gosh, he's like ten
Speaker 3: times nicer than I ever thought he could.
Speaker 2: Is he like is he like Canadian nice?
Speaker 3: That's a really good question. I don't know how to
Speaker 3: answer that, but I will say, absurdly nice. So however
Speaker 3: you define.
Speaker 2: You, because Isaac Canadian nice. Canadian nice is like so nice.
Speaker 2: It's like I still remember the first time I went
Speaker 2: to Getada and first time ever went there, and everyone
Speaker 2: was so nice. I swear I was like in a
Speaker 2: horror movie, like they're gonna kill me. This is way
Speaker 2: too nice. I don't understand why.
Speaker 3: Well, you're also coming from Los Angeles too, a film
Speaker 3: of Los Angeles. I mean, you could not ask.
Speaker 4: For a more like culture, shock horribly.
Speaker 3: Mean, spirited people, the community to come from.
Speaker 2: What do you mean, sir, La? What how dare you? Sir?
Speaker 4: Los Angeles is where all the friendly people are.
Speaker 2: But they are, but La is the nicest. They give
Speaker 2: you the nice FEUs, the nicest FEUs ever. Like I've
Speaker 2: never it's an art form here. They'll never You'll never
Speaker 2: hear the word no ever ever. It's just we're passing.
Speaker 2: Like you go to New York, Dude, your stuff sucks
Speaker 2: and I'm not going to do it. That's like what
Speaker 2: you hear in New York.
Speaker 4: I just I just don't I know it's true.
Speaker 3: I just don't want to admit that it's true because
Speaker 3: I hope that it'll change some days. From Baltimore originally,
Speaker 3: by the way, so I'm used to the same thing.
Speaker 3: You get on the bus and the bus drivers, you know,
Speaker 3: drop an F bomb in there and be like are
Speaker 3: you fucking coming on the bus and you leaving the bus.
Speaker 3: I'm like, let know you.
Speaker 2: Let's move let's move it along kind of thing with
Speaker 2: the bus.
Speaker 3: All right.
Speaker 2: So before we get started, man, how did you get
Speaker 2: into the film business in the first place?
Speaker 3: That is a great question. Uh, yes, I grew up
Speaker 3: in Baltimore. It's basically in Baltimore. If you tell people
Speaker 3: you want to make movies or working, well, it's basically
Speaker 3: like saying you want to be an astronaut. It's like, honestly,
Speaker 3: I think saying you want to be an astronaut is
Speaker 3: actually a more reasonable job because there's a GUTA Space
Speaker 3: Center and all this stuff out there, Like there's actual
Speaker 3: MASSA employees walking around, So it's not really the most
Speaker 3: plausible thing to tell people. But uh, you know, I
Speaker 3: wanted to work in the film industry because I grew
Speaker 3: up and I love movies, and I think I fell
Speaker 3: into the trap that most filmmakers fall into, which is,
Speaker 3: oh my gosh, watching movies is so fun. I wonder
Speaker 3: how much fun it must be to make.
Speaker 2: It must be easy, it must be easy. I've seen
Speaker 2: the behind the scenes. It shouldn't be that different, of course.
Speaker 3: Yeah, I mean everyone's just having fun. You're eating snacks,
Speaker 3: so there's there's trailers.
Speaker 2: There's sushi, there's lobster tail. I mean, yeah, so you.
Speaker 3: Fall for that, and you know, you get into it.
Speaker 3: You start. I'd make movies and sounds of kids. It's
Speaker 3: like middle school. I was like trying to you know,
Speaker 3: play cameras and stuff like that. In high school, I
Speaker 3: actually got a job as a projectionist assistant where I
Speaker 3: was Actually my grades were terrible in high school, but
Speaker 3: I would go to the local theater every day and
Speaker 3: I'd work as the assistant over there, and eventually I
Speaker 3: made the jump to going to film school. Came out
Speaker 3: to when I found out that film schools actually care
Speaker 3: about more than just your film experience, which you know
Speaker 3: sounds no, it doesn't sound obvious. It was something I
Speaker 3: needed to learn. I buckled down. I went to Maryland,
Speaker 3: study my butt off, and then eventually got the grades,
Speaker 3: got into u c LA, did my film program there,
Speaker 3: and then I suffered the I think the thing that
Speaker 3: I'm sure a lot of listeners can say that they
Speaker 3: suffered from, which is the post film school blues of
Speaker 3: feeling elite and you feel like you're the best, and
Speaker 3: you worked really hard and you get into this program
Speaker 3: and you come out and people literally won't you to
Speaker 3: clean their shoes.
Speaker 4: So you mean reality, you're talking about reality?
Speaker 3: I'm just reality TV.
Speaker 2: No No, no, that's that's life. You mean life hitting you,
Speaker 2: smacking you upside the head and going no, no, no,
Speaker 2: you're not as cool as you think you are. Yes,
Speaker 2: we all.
Speaker 4: It's the worst feeling in the world.
Speaker 3: If there's anyone listening to this that it feels like
Speaker 3: they're in that place in their life. I'm not going
Speaker 3: to say that it doesn't get worse than that, but
Speaker 3: I'm going to say that that is a low point,
Speaker 3: and it's normal to being a low point there.
Speaker 2: That's okay, Yeah, it isn't It is a normal place
Speaker 2: out of I mean out of film school.
Speaker 3: I was.
Speaker 2: I started working at Universal Studios Florida doing PA work.
Speaker 3: Oh, I was.
Speaker 2: In PA work. I was a translator for Global Guts,
Speaker 2: the Nickelodeon show. And then I just realized a while
Speaker 2: I was like, this sucks. This is not what theyre
Speaker 2: I was told that I was gonna make one hundred
Speaker 2: million dollar movies. This is this is you know, my
Speaker 2: last name should be Spielberg.
Speaker 3: I don't understand to me who lies around.
Speaker 2: Oh, I can tell you who lied to you. The
Speaker 2: one that you're paying that bill to every month to
Speaker 2: pay back your student loan, that's the one that's the
Speaker 2: one who lied to you.
Speaker 3: You're driving a hot take there, like in terms of
Speaker 3: the you know, obviously the film school versus no film
Speaker 3: school debate. It's a hot topic, right.
Speaker 4: Yes, I gotta be honesome when I when I.
Speaker 3: First got out, and for probably ten years afterwards, I
Speaker 3: thought for sure no film school, right, because I was
Speaker 3: like the golden boy in film school too, Like I
Speaker 3: graduated like top my class, I like.
Speaker 4: A director's all this stuff, and it came out in just.
Speaker 3: Nothing right, crickets. But I think it takes a certain
Speaker 3: amount of time to see the people around you grow
Speaker 3: up and become because I think when you first graduate,
Speaker 3: you look around and you look at your friends and
Speaker 3: you're like, man, I'm an idiot, and all of these
Speaker 3: people that I graduated with our idiots, Like what network
Speaker 3: are they talking about here? And what you don't realize
Speaker 3: is that it's not that it's idiots, and it's not
Speaker 3: that you're an idiot. It's just that it takes time
Speaker 3: for everyone to grow into the thing that they've become.
Speaker 3: And you know, now everyone that I look to now
Speaker 3: is you know, producing something or shooting something or directing something.
Speaker 3: And it's a great feeling because it's like sceeds, right,
Speaker 3: they got to grow up into something someday. So now
Speaker 3: I don't really know. I'm kind of torn on the
Speaker 3: film school thing. I do believe that if you're really
Speaker 3: motivated and dedicated, you can learn everything that you've learned
Speaker 3: in film school plus more online. You can learn it
Speaker 3: from other people. I can learn it just by doing it.
Speaker 3: If you take that money and make a movie, you
Speaker 3: can do it. I feel the same way about business.
Speaker 2: But we'll be right back after a word from our
Speaker 2: sponsor and now back to the show.
Speaker 3: Or a certain person out there that you know can't
Speaker 3: make that jump or doesn't have that self drive, I
Speaker 3: don't think it's a bad move anymore. I've flipped on that, but.
Speaker 2: Argua but arguably speaking though, if you don't have the
Speaker 2: drive to go to to self educate yourself, do you
Speaker 2: think you're going to have the drive to make it
Speaker 2: in this business?
Speaker 3: That's a really good question. That's a really good film.
Speaker 2: I mean, if you're like I don't want to like
Speaker 2: have to do work to learn, I need someone to
Speaker 2: tell me what to do, because that's the way the
Speaker 2: film business is. Yeah, that's there's going to be someone
Speaker 2: holding your hand through this entire product, especially indie film.
Speaker 3: Oh absolutely, yeah, Ani film is a nightmare, right and
Speaker 3: like again, I'm speaking to people mostly that are in
Speaker 3: the States, right, because you know, you got publicly funded
Speaker 3: arts in like Germany, sure and like a lot of places. Sure,
Speaker 3: that's a different thing, and there's there's downsides to that,
Speaker 3: and there's outsides to that. But if you're doing indie
Speaker 3: film in the States or any place that doesn't have
Speaker 3: publicly funded arts, man, it is.
Speaker 4: It ain't easy.
Speaker 2: It ain't easy in this world, all right. So you
Speaker 2: get out, you realize that the world sucks and they
Speaker 2: lied to you, and now you're in this dark, depressive place.
Speaker 2: Where do you go from there? Sir?
Speaker 3: Okay, So I get lucky. Actually, so I start. I
Speaker 3: just I just start owner operating. I just I got
Speaker 3: a camera. I start shooting things. I shoot everything. I
Speaker 3: shoot bad weddings, I see horrible commercials for the people
Speaker 3: down the street. I start taking on just little gigs
Speaker 3: here and there. I find my way eventually onto a
Speaker 3: set until I started doing a kind of a spiff
Speaker 3: in terms of working in reality documentary. And this is
Speaker 3: back when I think, you know, Shark Week was. I
Speaker 3: don't know if it's still as big as it was
Speaker 3: back then, was a big Yeah, it's still a big deal.
Speaker 4: I got in because originally from.
Speaker 3: Baltimore in Silver Spring Over in Maryland. Discovery channels out there.
Speaker 3: So I had a couple of friends that were from
Speaker 3: the Discovery Channel people, and I met some people on
Speaker 3: set and I just started working as the like go
Speaker 3: to guy for the Shark Week people. And I was
Speaker 3: the guy that was no as And really this is
Speaker 3: because I was just some kid out of film school.
Speaker 4: I was known as the guy that could do it
Speaker 4: for really cheap.
Speaker 3: It would be okay, not that great, but I could
Speaker 3: get it done quickly and for a budget that everyone
Speaker 3: else would be like, hell no, we're not doing that.
Speaker 4: Eventually, the guys that I started working.
Speaker 3: For were the company that would get contracted down to
Speaker 3: do Sharp Week, and they'd get contracted to do these
Speaker 3: kind of like big discovery gigs here and there. But
Speaker 3: you know, just like any freelancer, entrepreneur, company owner knows,
Speaker 3: you get reached out to from time to time with
Speaker 3: low ball gigs, right, And they used to just say
Speaker 3: no to those gigs and they would just start throwing
Speaker 3: them to me. And I was the guy that was like, oh,
Speaker 3: you'll pay me the holy camera, Hell yeah, I just
Speaker 3: would shoot anything. I would work anything, didn't matter, right.
Speaker 3: I did that for a while until eventually I got lucky.
Speaker 3: Those group of guys actually reached out to me after
Speaker 3: a couple of years of doing videos, and I think
Speaker 3: what they were noticing is the same thing that I
Speaker 3: think everyone could say is still happening now, is that
Speaker 3: the budgets for all these projects were going down and
Speaker 3: they felt like they needed to bring on someone that
Speaker 3: you know, was scrappy, that could do the kind of
Speaker 3: the lower budget project that they got thrown. So they
Speaker 3: actually ended up bringing me on as their C string director,
Speaker 3: which I didn't know what that was until the time.
Speaker 3: But there's a a director, there's a B director and
Speaker 3: a C string director. It's like legal firms, right, Like
Speaker 3: when you hire like a law firm or something, you
Speaker 3: go after the first person the name whose person is
Speaker 3: on the legal firm, but then they don't actually work
Speaker 3: on it. They pass it to their B person if
Speaker 3: their B person doesn't want to work on at their
Speaker 3: president of person. Right. So that was me doing educational
Speaker 3: videos for McDonald's and doing you know, I would do
Speaker 3: like the how to set up your car BMW videos
Speaker 3: and stuff like that.
Speaker 2: Oh hey, it paid, It paid something, it.
Speaker 4: Paid, and you know what I was.
Speaker 3: I was really lucky because I think I got paid
Speaker 3: to direct really early on, which is something that I
Speaker 3: think a lot of people, Oh that's awesome.
Speaker 2: I mean, yeah, look, I would have killed to direct.
Speaker 2: I was. I was editing. So basically when you were
Speaker 2: doing a camera I was doing in posts. So that's
Speaker 2: why my IMDb is like one hundred credit long. And
Speaker 2: that's not even including the yeah, just post and not
Speaker 2: even including commercials, music videos and all this other crap
Speaker 2: that I did. And I did anything for any if
Speaker 2: it walked in the door, I did it.
Speaker 3: Were you an editor or were you like an editing
Speaker 3: assistant on pioscoping for a long time and it was like, man.
Speaker 2: No, I did editing.
Speaker 3: I did.
Speaker 2: I was an assistant for like a minute. And then
Speaker 2: I went off and started freelance editing commercials and music
Speaker 2: videos and things like that. Then slowly I got into
Speaker 2: feature editing. Then after that I got into color grading.
Speaker 2: After that I did online editorial, and then and then
Speaker 2: post production supervision and then VFFCT super So I started
Speaker 2: just adding more tools in the toolbox because if I
Speaker 2: couldn't get paid to edit, I could color, and if
Speaker 2: I'm not getting paid to color, I could do post
Speaker 2: supervisor and then package it all together.
Speaker 3: Dude, dude, I think post is the smartest way to Again,
Speaker 3: and maybe the grass is always greener, but I actually
Speaker 3: legitimately believed editing if you want to if you want
Speaker 3: to write or direct or any of that stuff, like right,
Speaker 3: let me write. Most people want to write and direct. Right,
Speaker 3: if you want to do either of those things, I
Speaker 3: really think post is the way to enter because that's
Speaker 3: when you assembly. This is going to sound like belittling
Speaker 3: a bunch of jobs. That Again, I'm coming from a
Speaker 3: very camera heavy cinematography world, so please, if you're hearing
Speaker 3: it from anyone, please hear it from me. Almost everything
Speaker 3: is like building the blocks for someone to edit. Right,
Speaker 3: You're like making a bunch of legos. At the end
Speaker 3: of the day, someone's got to put the story together.
Speaker 3: That's the editor. So if you want to write and direct,
Speaker 3: I don't think that there's any better practice in the
Speaker 3: world than post.
Speaker 2: Oh I would agree with thee hundred percent. It helps me.
Speaker 2: So when I started directing commercials and directing TV and
Speaker 2: all that kind of stuff, it I could move so
Speaker 2: much quicker than anybody else. I mean I was doing
Speaker 2: and ten and twenty setups a day, just flying because
Speaker 2: I just knew what I needed. I didn't have to
Speaker 2: wait to like, oh, we're just going to take that
Speaker 2: whole shot. I'm like, no, no, stop right there, I'm
Speaker 2: going to cut there. Let's move on here. Yeah, And
Speaker 2: it just it works so so much better. And not
Speaker 2: that I'm a bit older than you, but so you know,
Speaker 2: I did. I didn't have the ability to learn editing
Speaker 2: at home. I had to you know, I had to
Speaker 2: drive an hour, get there early, work on the Avid,
Speaker 2: stay late.
Speaker 3: It's I don't care even if it was slower, even
Speaker 3: if it was harder. Just learning how to assemble something, yes,
Speaker 3: and just know and be that close to the finished product.
Speaker 3: I think it's priceless, man, because everything else is just
Speaker 3: so vague and ephemeral, and you don't know what's important
Speaker 3: until you see it in the edit.
Speaker 2: Absolutely so then, so I wanted to ask you, man.
Speaker 2: You obviously you know, the first time I, you know,
Speaker 2: discovered you was through Aperture and in that company, and
Speaker 2: you're the president of Aperture. Uh. And for people who
Speaker 2: don't know what aperture is, it's a lighting company, a
Speaker 2: very cool lighting company. How did you get involved with
Speaker 2: that company? And you know, how did you jump from
Speaker 2: you know, doing really bad wedding videos to the president
Speaker 2: of aperture.
Speaker 4: It's a really good question. That's a really good question
Speaker 4: that obviously.
Speaker 3: I had my stent kind of doing the directing for
Speaker 3: that production company, which which that was. That was good,
Speaker 3: that was fun. I would basically get asked to bid
Speaker 3: on a job maybe probably somewhere between fifteen and twenty
Speaker 3: times a year. I would put bids in and realistically
Speaker 3: it probably on a good year, i'd win I don't
Speaker 3: know what, six to seven. On a bad year, i'd
Speaker 3: only win like three or four gigs out of that,
Speaker 3: and they were like pretty big gigs. I could spend
Speaker 3: my time and shoot that. I could live off that
Speaker 3: for a while. At a certain point, things start to
Speaker 3: slow down, so I decided, oh, man, I need to
Speaker 3: find other work outside of just this being repped at
Speaker 3: this company. It's they're not giving me enough work right now.
Speaker 3: So I can't say the name of the people. But
Speaker 3: I went off and I eventually ended up becoming a
Speaker 3: channel manager for a jumbo YouTube star. And I'm talking
Speaker 3: like early early YouTube. What year?
Speaker 2: What year are we talking about? What years are we
Speaker 2: talking about?
Speaker 4: I don't want to say, okay, okay, it's early.
Speaker 2: Look, it's only been around for like fifty ten to
Speaker 2: twelve years, so it's not.
Speaker 4: Yeah that long, someone's gonna piece it together, right.
Speaker 3: But I ended up working for a really early YouTube.
Speaker 3: It's a little cringe, is why I say it too.
Speaker 3: Because I wasn't really happy with a lot of the
Speaker 3: work that I was doing, but it was paying, it
Speaker 3: was regular. This is like the gold rush of YouTube
Speaker 3: to A lot of money was coming in and you.
Speaker 2: Could and you can still cheat. You can still cheat
Speaker 2: to get your stuff up on on the on the
Speaker 2: front page.
Speaker 4: I actually, to be honest, I wasn't doing a lot.
Speaker 3: I was basically managing the production schedule and making sure
Speaker 3: that that the videos would come out on time.
Speaker 2: I actually had the Rocket Jump guys on and they
Speaker 2: told me there are techniques what they did back to
Speaker 2: the day.
Speaker 4: You could just you could just just do a thing
Speaker 4: to tweak it.
Speaker 2: And you were on the front page. That's why they
Speaker 2: have nine million freaking subscribers.
Speaker 3: Yes, yeah, yeah, yeah, And you know what that that
Speaker 3: stuff is is life changing and I still think that
Speaker 3: way about most new film technology that comes out. The
Speaker 3: first one to get there and break it before it
Speaker 3: is too hard to break.
Speaker 4: Dude, you you read the rewards.
Speaker 3: Get on those guys, all right.
Speaker 2: So you're working, you working on YouTube, so.
Speaker 3: Doing YouTube channel, managing for a big guy out there. Eventually,
Speaker 3: I'm not happy with the work I'm doing there. I'm
Speaker 3: kind of getting this sort of I'm getting the trickle
Speaker 3: of commercial gigs. I'm not really happy with a lot
Speaker 3: of it. And I get reached out to by this
Speaker 3: person who is the he's one of my mentors, but
Speaker 3: his wife's brother reaches out to me and says, hey,
Speaker 3: you know, I have this gear company. We're doing really
Speaker 3: well in like Asia, I'm doing really well in Europe,
Speaker 3: but I don't really know why we're not selling anywhere else.
Speaker 3: And I want to hire someone in the States to
Speaker 3: come help out with that. My buddy Travis, who's the
Speaker 3: guy that recommended me for the gig, was like, he says,
Speaker 3: he'd be a really good job for this. What do
Speaker 3: you think it'll pay. It's a regular gig. And I
Speaker 3: was like, fine, I will take full time, regular work,
Speaker 3: but I'm not really sure at the time, and I
Speaker 3: go and I meet this guy. And this guy is
Speaker 3: you know, he's a guard from China who becomes a
Speaker 3: very good friend of mine now and he's an amazing mentor.
Speaker 2: But we'll be right back after a word from ours,
Speaker 2: and now back to the show.
Speaker 3: I meet this guy in this warehouse thirty miles east
Speaker 3: of Los Angeles, and I sit down, and I swear
Speaker 3: it looks straight out of like a like a James
Speaker 3: Bond of Me or something like the light start. Damn,
Speaker 3: I'm sitting in empty warehouse. There's like two chairs, and
Speaker 3: we're looking at each other and.
Speaker 4: We're just talking rights.
Speaker 3: To be honest, as soon as I walked in, like
Speaker 3: my first thing that I'm thinking is like, I need
Speaker 3: to get out of here. This is not a good situation.
Speaker 3: Like this is clearly not legitimate. Why did my mentor
Speaker 3: like recommend me for this thing? But we started talking
Speaker 3: about equipment, and you know, this isn't that long ago.
Speaker 3: This is twenty thirteen or something like that, And this
Speaker 3: is just after the DSLR booms happened. Right, DSLR boom happens.
Speaker 3: Everyone's shooting movies. All of a sudden, cameras are affordable,
Speaker 3: Oh my gosh. And we talk about this thing, and
Speaker 3: the big thing that he brings up is he talks
Speaker 3: about how he thinks that cameras have gotten affordable now,
Speaker 3: filmmaking and accessories are also going to need to get
Speaker 3: more affordable now because all of a sudden, the only
Speaker 3: people making movies are not just studios and Hollywood filmmakers.
Speaker 3: It's the first time that independent artists are coming in.
Speaker 3: It's the first time that businesses do to make video.
Speaker 3: And we talked about it for a while and at
Speaker 3: first I'm kind of I'm kind of dubious. I'm like, no,
Speaker 3: like gear is expensive because it needs to be expensive,
Speaker 3: and like he asks me to bring some of my gear,
Speaker 3: and I brought, uh, you know, I don't mind saying
Speaker 3: this name. Actually I brought I brought this red rock handle,
Speaker 3: but it like screwed it on camera. Yeah you remember
Speaker 3: that handle, right, Yeah? You remember it was like it
Speaker 3: was like a three hundred.
Speaker 2: It's expensive as hell.
Speaker 3: Hell, and it used to be like the cheap option, right,
Speaker 3: And like I was really tapped in on the gear.
Speaker 3: I was a here nerd, so like I did all
Speaker 3: the research and I was like, oh my gosh, like
Speaker 3: this shoulder rig is only eighteen hundred dollars, and like,
Speaker 3: you know, he's looking at it and he's like, you know,
Speaker 3: like that's two bike handles and like some PVC, Like
Speaker 3: do you really think that's worth eighteen hundred dollars?
Speaker 4: Right, And you got to start thinking.
Speaker 3: Don't get me wrong, I get all the people out
Speaker 3: there that say fine eyes by twice, right, Like I
Speaker 3: have one of those people too, right, But when you
Speaker 3: have a niche industry that all of a sudden becomes
Speaker 3: blown up, and the people that are providing for that
Speaker 3: industry aren't pricing it for a lot of people that
Speaker 3: are just pricing it for studios, Like if Disney comes
Speaker 3: over to you and says, how much is a light?
Speaker 4: Yeah, dude, you you're Disney, It's ten grand a.
Speaker 3: Light, right, Yeah. But the whole thing that he said
Speaker 3: was he was like, I think that there's going to
Speaker 3: be this change that's going to happen someday. I don't
Speaker 3: have a lot of experience in the film industry, but
Speaker 3: I'm looking for someone that is a shooter, that understands filmmaking,
Speaker 3: that knows what the indie process looks like I can
Speaker 3: actually just try to push this stuff right. I didn't
Speaker 3: go to business school, I didn't do any of this.
Speaker 3: We head it off and eventually I end up saying, yeah,
Speaker 3: I think this is a okay, I'll do this, And
Speaker 3: in the back of my head, I'm thinking like, okay,
Speaker 3: maybe I'll do this for like six months or something.
Speaker 3: I'll do this for six months, I'll put it in notice,
Speaker 3: I'll leave, and you know it's winter. Summer comes around,
Speaker 3: the gigs always rolled in summer. I'll just do some work,
Speaker 3: say as to the job. I make a Facebook page,
Speaker 3: I make a Twitter page, LinkedIn, I make all the
Speaker 3: little things right. And it's fun to say that now
Speaker 3: because now those things are going up into something else.
Speaker 3: But I make these pages and I just start posting it.
Speaker 3: At the beginning. We have a zero dollar marketing budget.
Speaker 3: But the one thing that I think is, okay, you
Speaker 3: know what did I learn from all my days at YouTube?
Speaker 3: In fact, I didn't even It wasn't even that conscious.
Speaker 3: It was just like, oh, well, if I have this stuff,
Speaker 3: and I looked at it and I tried it, and
Speaker 3: I was like, this is good, and I don't see
Speaker 3: why people don't like it. Why don't I just start
Speaker 3: reaching out to people here and there, So I start
Speaker 3: reaching out to I'll say, if.
Speaker 4: I was doing this now, I probably would have reached
Speaker 4: out to you, Alex.
Speaker 3: I probably would have reached out to me, I would
Speaker 3: have reached out to Darius, I would have reached out
Speaker 3: to anyone that has some kind of following online. And
Speaker 3: I just said, hey, I'll send you this thing. If
Speaker 3: you don't like it, that's fine. If you do like it,
Speaker 3: consider saying something about it. And yeah, now I say this,
Speaker 3: and everyone's like, well, that's the most obvious influencer marketing
Speaker 3: crap ever. But you gotta remember this is a different time.
Speaker 3: Nobody was doing it, and uh, what we found is
Speaker 3: that we were the only people that were doing that.
Speaker 3: So all of a sudden, you've got all these YouTubers
Speaker 3: and online people being like, oh my gosh, like you're
Speaker 3: reaching out to me for this, and you want to
Speaker 3: send me like a six hundred dollars light like that's like,
Speaker 3: oh my gosh, Like yes, like, let me look at this.
Speaker 4: And to be fair, the gear was pretty good, but
Speaker 4: I think a.
Speaker 3: Lot of it was also that nobody was reaching out
Speaker 3: at the time, Nobody was taking them seriously.
Speaker 4: No one taking no one was taking the online filmmaking
Speaker 4: community seriously.
Speaker 3: And I think even today we're still starting to see
Speaker 3: the online film making and you get taken more seriously.
Speaker 3: It's blown up a lot. It's changed, like crazy, right,
Speaker 3: like we live in a day and there and now
Speaker 3: where you know, Cannon pays like a quarter mile to
Speaker 3: like someone like the top like crazy again, not not me,
Speaker 3: but like these like crazy something.
Speaker 2: Yeah, that was his name, Peter what's his name, Peter
Speaker 2: something or other? Oh god, I think And okay, the
Speaker 2: big guys things. I have no idea Peter Cannon or
Speaker 2: something like that.
Speaker 3: Yeah, yeah, I know that all those are huge now
Speaker 3: it's crazy to me, which is insane, but nobody was
Speaker 3: taking them serious at the time. Because of that, we
Speaker 3: ended up just meeting these people, talking to these people,
Speaker 3: and to be honest, it was kind of radio sounds
Speaker 3: for a while any of the rolls. Around two months
Speaker 3: before ANAB I actually put in a notice to quit.
Speaker 3: I say, hey, you know, I've been here for ten months,
Speaker 3: which is longer than I expected to be there. I
Speaker 3: was like maybe eight months or something. Eight months. I've
Speaker 3: been there for longer than I had planned to be
Speaker 3: there for. And I said, hey, you know, I had
Speaker 3: a lot of fun. Thank you for the opportunity. I
Speaker 3: appreciate being here. I still believe in the mission stuff
Speaker 3: that you're working on. But look, I'm looking at this
Speaker 3: Facebook page and nothing's really moving. I'm looking at YouTube page,
Speaker 3: I think really moving. And what happens is, all of
Speaker 3: a sudden, we go to NAB one year and the
Speaker 3: craziest thing happens. We're like this tiny ten by ten
Speaker 3: booth back in Asia corner right with like all the
Speaker 3: other cheap Asian brands, and we're we're there, and the
Speaker 3: weirdest thing happens day one, which is everybody from the
Speaker 3: internet just shows up better booth. Everybody you could ever
Speaker 3: think of from the internet shows up to our right
Speaker 3: like like I'm like MKPHD walks by at some point
Speaker 3: and literally it's so busy and packed and with these
Speaker 3: online people that all of a sudden, all of these
Speaker 3: fans of the online people see these online people there.
Speaker 4: So then random people are now at our time by
Speaker 4: ten and it's this swarm of people.
Speaker 3: I think I did something like like sixty to seventy
Speaker 3: interviews per day because every time I shot an interview,
Speaker 3: like three other people would see it and be like,
Speaker 3: why is this company so hyped?
Speaker 4: I need to go shoot a thing now.
Speaker 2: Dude, I gotta stop you. When I was doing research
Speaker 2: on you and when I typed you in, all I
Speaker 2: would see you is doing is and ab videos, Like
Speaker 2: that's all there other than the thousands of videos you've
Speaker 2: done yourself. I would just see interview after interview of
Speaker 2: baby and baby, like, dude, did this guy sleep?
Speaker 3: No?
Speaker 4: So this became now it's like a tradition or something.
Speaker 3: Right, It's like go to nap an interview ten, which
Speaker 3: is I think it's very flattering and great and.
Speaker 4: It's a good thing for the company too.
Speaker 3: But at the time it was we were just so
Speaker 3: shell shocked, right, Like we had like five people there maybe,
Speaker 3: and we're like overwhelmed by people. Like I think Shack
Speaker 3: came by at some point, Like Shack comes to NAB.
Speaker 2: You mean you mean Shaq Shaq Johnson or or I
Speaker 2: don't joking, Okay, I'm absolutely joking with you.
Speaker 3: Shack comes by and uh, you know they're like the
Speaker 3: booth is just so busy that he ends up walking
Speaker 3: by and uh, if becomes this crazy thing. We're at
Speaker 3: the end. Uh you know, one of the bigger gear
Speaker 3: companies out there actually asks like, hey, would you be
Speaker 3: interested in sitting down the talk business, And the big
Speaker 3: question all of a sudden becomes, uh, one, is aperture
Speaker 3: going to remain aperture by itself as an independent thing?
Speaker 3: Or Two? The second question when we all sat down
Speaker 3: and talked about this was are you still leaving? And
Speaker 3: I was like anything, it is supposed to be my
Speaker 3: last day. I was kind of just gonna show up
Speaker 3: and put my time and be out.
Speaker 2: But now you're like the face of Aperture.
Speaker 3: They love you. That's how life works. And let me
Speaker 3: just say too, Uh, there's like a lot of people
Speaker 3: that work in aperture that work super hard that I
Speaker 3: get credit. I get I get way more credit than
Speaker 3: I deserve on this stuff, really, and it's just because yeah,
Speaker 3: I can't say that's not seriously, there's there's so many
Speaker 3: people here that work super hard. So I do want
Speaker 3: to be clear that for the most part, people think
Speaker 3: I'm like some like black magic Wizard or something. We're
Speaker 3: just making products, and that's not the case. We have
Speaker 3: a team of engineers that work super freaking hard.
Speaker 2: I mean, you're not the one in the back actually
Speaker 2: designing and building it from from from scratch yourself, sir.
Speaker 3: That's and even the videos where you have like the
Speaker 3: team of people that help us make the video.
Speaker 2: You mean you don't do all those videos by yourself
Speaker 2: and editing by yourself.
Speaker 3: This is what people think they want, some feeling of
Speaker 3: some person doing something. It's absolutely not true. Anyways, it's
Speaker 3: up against the the epic saga that has become aperture.
Speaker 2: That's awesome.
Speaker 3: A lot of changes have happened since then. The team's
Speaker 3: grown like crazy, but we're now at a point now
Speaker 3: that you know, like Disney bought a whole bunch of lights,
Speaker 3: which is crazy.
Speaker 2: Did you charge them ten thousand dollars? Did you charge
Speaker 2: them ten?
Speaker 4: No?
Speaker 3: Absolutely not. In fact, they sat down they're like, well,
Speaker 3: what's the Disney price? And I was like, there is
Speaker 3: no Disney price, because like you get to realize that
Speaker 3: we sell for average judgemo filmmakers, right Like I talked
Speaker 3: to gear companies that are like, we feel bad when
Speaker 3: normal people buy our products because normal people aren't supposed
Speaker 3: to buy our products, right, Like, I would feel bad
Speaker 3: if you charge some guy down the street had like
Speaker 3: fourteen thousand dollars for some of these lights.
Speaker 2: I'm like, this is crazy now today's technology now, I
Speaker 2: mean before I would get it because there wasn't led
Speaker 2: technology that it actually did cost a lot to produce
Speaker 2: a professional cinema light, you know. And I mean I
Speaker 2: worked at those lights. I've used those lights. There are
Speaker 2: beasts and they last forever. Ever. We'll be right back
Speaker 2: after a word from our sponsor, and now back to
Speaker 2: the show.
Speaker 3: Yes, and I think it's also that when you make
Speaker 3: them for a small quantity of people, then yeah, you.
Speaker 2: Can do that.
Speaker 3: Yeah, the same reason why, like you know, diving gear, Well, look.
Speaker 2: That's why an Alexa look at an Alexa a lex'
Speaker 2: one hundred and twenty five thousand dollars for for for
Speaker 2: that's not for everybody, and arguably, unless you're have an
Speaker 2: ASC at the end of your name, it really doesn't
Speaker 2: matter as much when there's so many other options that
Speaker 2: can get you a really pretty picture that most people
Speaker 2: out there will never notice.
Speaker 3: And don't get me wrong, there are there are you know,
Speaker 3: there are real differences expenses, absolutely, but if you aren't,
Speaker 3: I would just urge most people to do a little
Speaker 3: more research, because look, what is it when when the
Speaker 3: you look at the camera that shots Superman returns, Oh,
Speaker 3: the Genesis, Yeah, it was some million.
Speaker 2: It was, but it was like it was like a
Speaker 2: It was kind of almost a Frankenstein between a Sony
Speaker 2: and Panas and a Panavision, and it was a beast.
Speaker 2: It was a monster. I saw that camera. It like
Speaker 2: the workflow was just built for five thousand post guys
Speaker 2: to work. It was just not a friendly can.
Speaker 3: The only thing I just want to say, and like
Speaker 3: this is not to cast shade on people that use
Speaker 3: the super expensive stuff, because it's okay to use the
Speaker 3: super you know what you're paying for, you know what
Speaker 3: you're paying But there's so many people out there that
Speaker 3: they see price equals quality and it's just not true
Speaker 3: a lot of the time. In fact, if I'm being
Speaker 3: honest with you, perception equals quality. So it's like, just
Speaker 3: be wary of marketing. Be wary of because it does.
Speaker 3: And when I say marketing, I don't mean just like
Speaker 3: some Super Bowl ad, right, Like I see this.
Speaker 4: Every time I watch a Super Bowl ad. The first
Speaker 4: thing I think is.
Speaker 3: Oh, if I buy that product, I'm paying for that
Speaker 3: Super Bowl ad, right, Like I can't buy it. I can't.
Speaker 3: It's really hard for me to buy a mothe because
Speaker 3: I'm like, damn, MOFY just bought like three super Bowl ads.
Speaker 3: I'm like, I just wanted to phone charger. I didn't
Speaker 3: want to pay for a Super Bowl l Likewise, I
Speaker 3: feel that way. The other type of marketing is where
Speaker 3: you stand back and you just price things really high,
Speaker 3: and you just say we're the best, and this is
Speaker 3: the price you're paying. And that perception is something that some.
Speaker 4: Can I cars on this show given a little.
Speaker 3: Bit, some asshole is sitting there thinking that it's just
Speaker 3: like me at some company that's trying to market stuff
Speaker 3: and sell stuff to you.
Speaker 4: Somebody's sitting there and thinking.
Speaker 3: By standing back and by being aloof and by pricing
Speaker 3: things high, this is how we'll get you to feel
Speaker 3: like it's worth more. This is all we get you
Speaker 3: to feel like it's royalty. And I have heard people
Speaker 3: say that I've paid in conversations about this stuff, and
Speaker 3: I just I want indie filmmakers to know and I
Speaker 3: think they already know this too, But know that one
Speaker 3: it's not really the gear, it's the artist. But two,
Speaker 3: if you're going to spend the money, you know what
Speaker 3: you're actually spending the money fine purchases.
Speaker 2: I mean, we were talking a little bit before we
Speaker 2: got on air about my movie on the Corner of
Speaker 2: Egan Desire and that movie if you want to talk
Speaker 2: about quality versus investment. I purchased a ten eighty p
Speaker 2: pocket camera, shot the entire movie on it. I blew
Speaker 2: it up to two K and projected it at the
Speaker 2: Chinese theater, and nobody believed that I shot it on
Speaker 2: a little camera the size of my iPhone with shot
Speaker 2: at raw. But I also knew what I could do
Speaker 2: with it in post because I have post experience. I
Speaker 2: had those tools in my toolbox, just like you know
Speaker 2: what you could do with certain cameras and certain lenses
Speaker 2: because that's your toolbox. So I knew what I would
Speaker 2: get out of it. It's not like I just grabbed
Speaker 2: an iPhone and shot a movie. I'm like, oh, look,
Speaker 2: how cool. But it's a perception where people were like
Speaker 2: if I would have led with that, people were like, oh,
Speaker 2: this is going to look like crap. And then when
Speaker 2: I saw it projected for the first time, I'm like,
Speaker 2: oh my god, this is probably one of the prettiest
Speaker 2: things I've ever shot in my entire life. It was
Speaker 2: just stunning for the story. I was telling him, if
Speaker 2: this is the Avengers, probably not.
Speaker 4: It's not going to fit, right, It's not.
Speaker 3: It's not going to fit a lot of what you're
Speaker 3: paying for is you're paying for. One is like intense reliability,
Speaker 3: which is that like, this thing will last forever and
Speaker 3: it's built like a tank and it's never going to break.
Speaker 3: Two is that you're also asking for like certain organomic
Speaker 3: things of like I just need it to do certain features.
Speaker 3: But if you're an anifilmmaker, you might never use those features, right,
Speaker 3: Like DMX is an easy one, right, like lighting boards
Speaker 3: and stuff like that. If you need that feature, you
Speaker 3: need that feature, and most high intros need that feature.
Speaker 3: But if you're an indie filmmaker, you're not going to
Speaker 3: be bringing a lightboard onto your set.
Speaker 4: So why are you paying for that function?
Speaker 2: Unless unless you're extremely pretentious?
Speaker 3: Yes you are.
Speaker 2: Hey, Hey, listen, listen. I said that. Ted didn't say that.
Speaker 2: If you're an ani filmmaker with a ten thousand dollars movie,
Speaker 2: you bust on a lightboard, You've got to re evaluate
Speaker 2: your you're a priority sir or man.
Speaker 3: There there are plenty of plenty of talented people that
Speaker 3: can make it do unless and maybe you're using different.
Speaker 4: But yeah, I completely agree.
Speaker 2: Yeah, I think.
Speaker 3: Uh so, now we're in this weird place where and
Speaker 3: I would say that the past two and a half
Speaker 3: years of After have been marked by this. Right, we've
Speaker 3: been doing this for seven eight years now. The past
Speaker 3: two and a half years in particular have been the
Speaker 3: indie community loves us, and we've kind of we really
Speaker 3: like we came from the bottom.
Speaker 2: Yeah, I think zero.
Speaker 4: There's people that come to the top.
Speaker 3: There feeple that come to the botto. We came to
Speaker 3: the bottom. We're going up. And we're now at the
Speaker 3: point that this is the first time I've ever heard
Speaker 3: this in my life, that the low end is like
Speaker 3: after where you're going your gear is becoming too expensive
Speaker 3: and a high end, which is mind blowing for me.
Speaker 3: But people from the high end are now saying, after
Speaker 3: stopped playing with the kids, we like what you're doing,
Speaker 3: make it for us. And we're in this weird situation
Speaker 3: where we're in the middle and nobody's ever happy. And
Speaker 3: I will say that the high end and the low
Speaker 3: end of filmmaking, they they hate each other.
Speaker 2: Man, No, there's it's it's two camps. I mean, like, yeah,
Speaker 2: when you say you made a movie for five or
Speaker 2: ten grand people look at you weird and they're like,
Speaker 2: how is that even humanly possible? And then and then
Speaker 2: how dare you make cinema for that little bit of money?
Speaker 2: And then there's the high end guys. Look, I I'm
Speaker 2: best friends with some asc guys who look at what
Speaker 2: I do sometimes and they just look at me like
Speaker 2: I don't understand. I don't I don't understand.
Speaker 3: I don't get it.
Speaker 2: I don't did you do this?
Speaker 3: It's and there's there's so much value in both of them. Yes, yes,
Speaker 3: there's so much value in both of them, and they're
Speaker 3: both right. It's just, uh, what's the end game either?
Speaker 2: But what's the end game of each?
Speaker 3: Yeah?
Speaker 2: What's the end game of each?
Speaker 3: Yeah?
Speaker 2: Yeah, Look, if you're if you if you're making one
Speaker 2: hundred million dollar movie, there's a there's a way to
Speaker 2: make that movie. If you're making a ten thousand dollar movie,
Speaker 2: there's a way to movie make that. Yeah.
Speaker 3: Yeah, that's just that's said it better than I could
Speaker 3: have ever said.
Speaker 2: That's just just the way it is. So people, But
Speaker 2: sometimes where you get. The problem is and I love this,
Speaker 2: and I'm sure you've come across this. And so when
Speaker 2: you get the indie filmmaker with the indie mentality and
Speaker 2: an indie film set, and then they get access to
Speaker 2: a high end DP who's working on a show who's
Speaker 2: got you know, a G and budget, that's it's seen,
Speaker 2: and he can't even understand how he could do anything
Speaker 2: with less than an Alexa and and and what's an
Speaker 2: ANGINEU you know one twenty or something like that that
Speaker 2: costs one hundred and ten thousand dollars. He can't work
Speaker 2: without that tool set because that is what he's used
Speaker 2: to doing, where I'm used to just like, get a
Speaker 2: cool lens, get a cool camera, let's make it happen.
Speaker 2: And but I've also worked at higher shows that the
Speaker 2: but that budgets. I'm not going to do that on
Speaker 2: a half a million dollars a million dollar show. That's
Speaker 2: that's not appropriate for that.
Speaker 3: Yes, and that right there, which you said, is what
Speaker 3: I wish I could tell everybody in terms of there's
Speaker 3: there's a high end and there's a low end, and
Speaker 3: for some reason they hate each other. I wish I
Speaker 3: could just tell people on the low end because it
Speaker 3: plays down to this, right, Like the low end thinks
Speaker 3: that there's no reason to spend that much money on
Speaker 3: the high end. And I know I sounded like I
Speaker 3: was talking, Yes, you can achieve amazing results with affordable gear.
Speaker 3: You can do that. But I just want to tell
Speaker 3: the low end people there is a really important reason
Speaker 3: for why people spend so much money on the high end,
Speaker 3: and that's because everything else costs a lot of money.
Speaker 3: That's because the details really matter. You're paying for the
Speaker 3: diminishing return, right, and you really need to pay for that.
Speaker 3: And those tools are incredible, but it costs a lot
Speaker 3: of money to really utilize them.
Speaker 2: Right, But you can't, like, you know, Chavo can't. You
Speaker 2: want Chavo to have the best paints, the best paint brush,
Speaker 2: the best canvas to do what he does, you know,
Speaker 2: or any of these high end.
Speaker 3: Mastor needs the greatest tools.
Speaker 2: He needs the best to So I want him to
Speaker 2: have a sixty five alexa. I want him to have
Speaker 2: you know, giant cranes that block off you know, he's
Speaker 2: flagging off the sun. I want him to do that
Speaker 2: because that's what a master of his statute deserves. To
Speaker 2: work with. And I'm not saying that he's better or
Speaker 2: worse than anybody else, but he is a master at
Speaker 2: what he does, so he you can't do what he
Speaker 2: does in the films that he does with, you know,
Speaker 2: with a ten thousand dollars kit. It's just not. But
Speaker 2: now on the other end, if you're.
Speaker 3: Making it's like we can tell the high end the
Speaker 3: low end is amazing and they can do incredible things
Speaker 3: for such little money.
Speaker 4: Please respect for that exactly.
Speaker 2: And I think it's just like how that the hop
Speaker 2: ends looking down, like how dare you? The bottom line
Speaker 2: is like up looking up and going, I screw you,
Speaker 2: you elite bastards.
Speaker 3: Yeah, you guys spend money frivolously. You don't realize what
Speaker 3: you're spending money. And no, no, no, it's not true. The
Speaker 3: high end knows exactly why they're spending the money that
Speaker 3: they spend, and there's a precise reason.
Speaker 2: For it, and it makes and it makes financial sense
Speaker 2: because the projects they're working on are by the time
Speaker 2: they're on set, that conversation has already had, it's already
Speaker 2: pre sold. They already know how much money they're going
Speaker 2: to make. If they're spending one hundred and fifty million dollars.
Speaker 2: I promise you, unless you're Cats, you're going to make
Speaker 2: your money.
Speaker 4: Back shots fire, Oh come.
Speaker 2: On, will be right back after a word from our sponsor.
Speaker 2: And now back to the show. Best, my favorite, my
Speaker 2: favorite tweet on Cats. I've get to see the movie.
Speaker 2: I'm dying to see the movie. I can't wait to
Speaker 2: see it, because that happens once in a lifetime. You
Speaker 2: get once maybe twice in a lifetime, of film like Cats.
Speaker 2: Cats is the worst thing to happen to cats since Dogs.
Speaker 2: I thought that was, guess just the best review of
Speaker 2: that movie. Cats is the worst thing that happened to
Speaker 2: cats and stalks. I just thought that was amazing. So anyway,
Speaker 2: we've gone off track. Okay, So I'm glad we got
Speaker 2: into this talk about gear because there is this whole
Speaker 2: gear porn subculture in the filmmaking space, and I've talked
Speaker 2: a little bit. I've had episodes about stop it with
Speaker 2: the gear porn. It doesn't matter. I don't care what
Speaker 2: your camera is, I don't care how much you spent.
Speaker 2: All I care about is a story, and I think,
Speaker 2: and please let me know what you think, and you
Speaker 2: can deny you could say you don't want to answer this,
Speaker 2: but I feel a lot of times that filmmakers use
Speaker 2: gear as an excuse not to do what they're saying
Speaker 2: they're supposed to do. Like for me, it took me
Speaker 2: twenty years to do my first feature because I kept saying, well,
Speaker 2: I need this to make that feature film. I need
Speaker 2: this camera, I need these resources. I can't get out
Speaker 2: of bed for less than a million. I have to
Speaker 2: make this movie for a million. I just can't do it.
Speaker 2: So then you start using the gear and you're like, oh,
Speaker 2: well I need a red this, or I need the Alexa,
Speaker 2: or I need this lens or I need that, And
Speaker 2: it's an excuse. It's just an excuse to not have
Speaker 2: to actually get up on plate and take a swing.
Speaker 2: Would you agree on that?
Speaker 3: I completely agree to that. For and like, let me
Speaker 3: the irony of this is, did I run a freaking
Speaker 3: gear company like we are when.
Speaker 2: You run an affordable gear company?
Speaker 4: People?
Speaker 3: No? No, But let me just say people livelihood, because
Speaker 3: now we're in a place that people say like apture
Speaker 3: is like the gold stand for a lot of people
Speaker 3: out there, right, So let me just say, you know,
Speaker 3: our livelihood depends on people loving and liking and gear
Speaker 3: and needing gear. You don't if you're an indie filmmaker
Speaker 3: out there, people use gear as procrastination the same way
Speaker 3: that I see people that try to make their own
Speaker 3: studios or buy their own studio. I'm just like, dude,
Speaker 3: what do you that has nothing to do with the
Speaker 3: thing you want to make. If you want to make
Speaker 3: that thing, go make that thing. Don't do a step
Speaker 3: A that leads to a step B. Don't do a
Speaker 3: step A that you don't like with the chance, the
Speaker 3: off chance that it might lead to a B that
Speaker 3: you like.
Speaker 2: Just do the B.
Speaker 3: Start off there, start off with a thing that you
Speaker 3: want to do, just setting out to do that. Being said,
Speaker 3: for the high end people right again, like seriously, I
Speaker 3: understand why, and I understand the results that you are
Speaker 3: that are capable if you peek out about gear, and
Speaker 3: it's amazing. But for ninety nine point nine percent of
Speaker 3: people out there, people just see as gears. I want
Speaker 3: to procrastinate and to research something that research isn't the
Speaker 3: best O time researches. Research is code for procrastination.
Speaker 2: Most I did a ton of that, Oh god, so much,
Speaker 2: so much. That's why I knew what that red rock
Speaker 2: handle was because I did. I did. I did research
Speaker 2: on that I did. I did so much research just this.
Speaker 3: Everyone doesn't. They say I want to I want to
Speaker 3: work in film, and you know they sign up for
Speaker 3: you know, I'm just as guilty of this as anybody else.
Speaker 3: Like it's fun to research. It's fun to feel like
Speaker 3: you're learning when you're not actually learning in the fastest
Speaker 3: possibly it feels good, right like, and and you know,
Speaker 3: I have people that reach out to me for for
Speaker 3: mobile or reach out for aperture, and I'm sure you
Speaker 3: probably get the same thing on any film muscle. But
Speaker 3: you know, I want to say thank you for supporting
Speaker 3: stuff and being a part of it. But also like, dude,
Speaker 3: go go make something if that's your goal, Like like.
Speaker 2: The two year old light that you bought from us
Speaker 2: a couple of years ago. It still works. You're good,
Speaker 2: it works.
Speaker 3: Go go make something, dude, Like they go chase your dreams.
Speaker 3: Don't chase talking about your dreams. You know, I have
Speaker 3: no horse in this race. I have no horse in
Speaker 3: this prace. I literally benefit from the opposite.
Speaker 2: So no, no, And the bottom line is that because
Speaker 2: there's as you know, and I know this might sound
Speaker 2: as a shocking statement, but there are a lot of
Speaker 2: talkers in our business who just like to talk and
Speaker 2: hear their own voice, and they don't actually go out
Speaker 2: and do it. So that's why when someone comes up
Speaker 2: and says, hey, I'm going to go make something and
Speaker 2: they actually do it, it is a revelation. It is
Speaker 2: an absolute revelation, like, oh, he actually gets get something,
Speaker 2: that she gets something done, as opposed to talking about
Speaker 2: it for a year. We all know that that writer
Speaker 2: who's been working on that screenplay for five years, that
Speaker 2: one screenplay for five years. We all know. Look, I
Speaker 2: knew a guy who directed a short film and it
Speaker 2: lasted four years in post, five years in post because
Speaker 2: he just kept tweaking and moving and this and that,
Speaker 2: because he never if he let go of it, he
Speaker 2: would have nothing else. And he knew that was the
Speaker 2: only thing he was going to like. He felt like
Speaker 2: that was the only thing he was going to get.
Speaker 2: So there's that. And then when they use gear, they
Speaker 2: use oh I needed to be perfect or this and that,
Speaker 2: and all of a sudden you wake up in your
Speaker 2: seventy and.
Speaker 4: Let me let me just say too, like I like
Speaker 4: part of mogul Is.
Speaker 3: And again you see this all the time too, is
Speaker 3: that we talk to high end like the best ASC
Speaker 3: filmmakers out there every week, and when we talk they
Speaker 3: tell us every single one of them has some story
Speaker 3: about like, oh, we didn't really have the tool we needed,
Speaker 3: so we had to just Jerry.
Speaker 2: Rig right, Absolutely everybody.
Speaker 3: Has that story. So if that story exists on the
Speaker 3: top of the top highest end production, why are you
Speaker 3: using your lack of gear as an excuse to not
Speaker 3: get something done on the lower production?
Speaker 2: Every DP I've ever worked with has has some sort
Speaker 2: of magic rig, magic light that costs five dollars that
Speaker 2: gives us like the coolest strobe effect or something like that.
Speaker 2: When I had I had Russell Carpenter on the show
Speaker 2: a while ago. He's amazing. Russell is amazing. For everyone
Speaker 2: who doesn't know Russell is he's a DP of Titanic
Speaker 2: and the New Avatars and ant Man and stuff. And
Speaker 2: you know, everyone was gonna and I was gonna get
Speaker 2: into true Lies and Titanic. But the first question I
Speaker 2: asked him, like, so Critters too, how was that? He's like,
Speaker 2: what no one's asked ever asked me about Critters too?
Speaker 2: I'm like, oh, yes, we're gonna get to Titanic and
Speaker 2: True Lies and ant Man and all the other ones.
Speaker 2: But Critters too, How did you light that? Because I
Speaker 2: want to know how you. Russell Carpenter Academy Award winning
Speaker 2: ac cinematographer lit Critters too. And it was just such
Speaker 2: a wonderful conversation. But I put it in the show
Speaker 2: notes because I know people are gonna go, I want
Speaker 2: to listen to that. So it was a fun, fun conversation.
Speaker 2: But it's so true cinematographers. I mean, I've got it.
Speaker 2: I've worked with so many cinematographers over the course of
Speaker 2: my career and they will just come up with like
Speaker 2: these homemade rigs, Like I remember, uh not a certain
Speaker 2: that's is a circle light? What is it called?
Speaker 3: Like a a a ring light, a ring light.
Speaker 2: Before ring lights were ring lights, you know, there was
Speaker 2: the wooden built ring light with light bulbs built in.
Speaker 2: This is like going back into the nineties for like
Speaker 2: music video styles.
Speaker 3: Still no dps that are using like strip lights that
Speaker 3: are just like they basically look like makeup lights. But
Speaker 3: they bring them one sets and dude, they bring them
Speaker 3: onto big sets. It's literally like a home depot strip.
Speaker 2: Of Deacons did that? Deacons did that for like Blade us, Yeah.
Speaker 3: All the time. Absolutely most look your your you know,
Speaker 3: everything goes according to plan until it doesn't, right, and
Speaker 3: like your job is to when it doesn't go according
Speaker 3: to plant, So you know, stop freaking out. Just don't
Speaker 3: have the tools. Do you feel like you need for
Speaker 3: things to go according to plan? Start moving and being
Speaker 3: ready and preparing and practicing to just let things get
Speaker 3: out of hand and figure it out.
Speaker 4: That's the job.
Speaker 3: And totally.
Speaker 2: So we could keep talking about gear for about another
Speaker 2: forty five minutes, but uh or four or five hours.
Speaker 2: But I wanted to get into Indie mogul Man because
Speaker 2: is when I heard you you went over to Indie
Speaker 2: mogul I was like, well this this I didn't see
Speaker 2: this coming.
Speaker 3: And uh yeah.
Speaker 2: So I had Griffin on the show and I asked
Speaker 2: him like, wow, how did Ted get involved? Like I didn't,
Speaker 2: and there's like He's like no, it was great, he
Speaker 2: was great. We wanted to bring him in and it
Speaker 2: just all worked out and blah blah blah. I'm like,
Speaker 2: you know how Griffin is and like the sweetest, like
Speaker 2: Canadian sweet, Canadian sweet, he's Canadian sweet. Uh you can
Speaker 2: quote me on that. He's like super canadianswere He's so nice.
Speaker 2: But so you So, how did you get involved with
Speaker 2: indie mogul And explain to people who have not god
Speaker 2: forbid have not heard of indie mogul because it is
Speaker 2: one of the original YouTube channels teaching filmmaking on h
Speaker 2: on the platform. So tell me how you got involved
Speaker 2: in how the hell story happened?
Speaker 3: Yeah, that's a great question. Es. Basically, we we We've
Speaker 3: always been been in touch with the YouTube community. We've
Speaker 3: always been in touch with the online community of filmmakers.
Speaker 3: And back when Anyboddell had its first They'll Comeback, they
Speaker 3: were talking about it and I reached out and just said, hey,
Speaker 3: big fan of the channel, I watched the channel. I
Speaker 3: honestly watched the channel way way way back when I
Speaker 3: watched and seen all the rest. I reached out just
Speaker 3: to say, hey, as a fan, do you ever need anything,
Speaker 3: just let us know. I'll send over some lights. You
Speaker 3: don't have to do anything with it. I don't care.
Speaker 3: As always, you don't do anything with that, I'll send
Speaker 3: it to you. And we started talking, and as we talked,
Speaker 3: once called justin. The original founder actually reached out and said,
Speaker 3: do you have we're thinking about bringing in another host,
Speaker 3: do you have anybody that you think would be a
Speaker 3: good recommendation, because you know all the online people. So
Speaker 3: I made this long list of like all the people
Speaker 3: that I thought were great. And again, if you listening
Speaker 3: to this podcast, I'm sure you probably have seen a
Speaker 3: video from probably most of those people on that list.
Speaker 3: I've been a long list of can we tell you
Speaker 3: all the people that I think are great? And here's
Speaker 3: the reasons why.
Speaker 2: We'll be right back after a word from our sponsor
Speaker 2: and now back to the show.
Speaker 3: And sent it and it was kind of radio silence, right.
Speaker 3: I didn't really get a response, and I was like, man,
Speaker 3: that was like kind of rude. I like put in
Speaker 3: all this time, and like, you know, I was trying
Speaker 3: to support some people.
Speaker 4: And eventually, like a couple of.
Speaker 3: Months passed and you know, like a good idea kind
Speaker 3: of stalks you. It stocks you right, like you can't
Speaker 3: shake it. You know, you're you're you're eating portos at
Speaker 3: four thirty pm in the afternoon by yourself, and the
Speaker 3: idea comes back. And the idea was really simple, is
Speaker 3: just you know what would happen if I just asked
Speaker 3: and said, you know, hey, I am a huge fan
Speaker 3: of the show. I loved it since the very beginning.
Speaker 3: I know all the hosts. This is a point in
Speaker 3: which too that Apture had been doing We've been doing
Speaker 3: lighting content forever, and you know, a lot of people
Speaker 3: like the After Channel, but so many people had come
Speaker 3: up to me too and said, can you teach things
Speaker 3: that aren't just lighting? Can you bring in people or
Speaker 3: experts that can show us other things? And it doesn't
Speaker 3: really make sense for Apture and teach like drone piloting
Speaker 3: or like Kimberle script writing.
Speaker 4: Yeah, absolutely doesn't makes sense. Doesn't make sense at all.
Speaker 4: So I was thinking it was already kind of cooking.
Speaker 3: That maybe we'd just start like a separate channel, or
Speaker 3: maybe it'd be like a ten SIM channel or something different.
Speaker 3: And I got to be honest, a lot of the
Speaker 3: motivation for that, and the motivation of the Aperture channel
Speaker 3: in the first place, was I the longer I was
Speaker 3: here at Aperture, the longer I was OFFSET. And you know,
Speaker 3: the film industry and it changes so fast every day,
Speaker 3: it changes, it's so hard to keep up with it.
Speaker 3: And like that's why it's great to have all in
Speaker 3: education and things like this podcast will keep up. But
Speaker 3: I was feeling a little bit like all the tools
Speaker 3: that people were using on set were changing. So for
Speaker 3: me at aperture, people think it's just an educational thing,
Speaker 3: but guess what, it's also educational for me because I
Speaker 3: get to go, I get to invite my favorite freaking
Speaker 3: DP in the world to come out teaches some things
Speaker 3: about lighting and I am always in the know, and
Speaker 3: it brought me back on the set and you know,
Speaker 3: it's made everything that much better. Sure with Mogul. Basically,
Speaker 3: I reached out and I said, hey, like, what do
Speaker 3: you think about this idea? You know? And I reached
Speaker 3: out and they were like, well, like duh, you know,
Speaker 3: this is like a part of the reason, you know.
Speaker 4: When you ask a question like hey, do you know
Speaker 4: of anyone we're.
Speaker 2: Just trying to be kind, asked we want to take
Speaker 2: you to the prom.
Speaker 3: Yes, it was Uh, it was great. It ended up
Speaker 3: being like this perfect fit and we ended up talking
Speaker 3: to Eric and Don't about it, and they've been talking
Speaker 3: about how they wanted to see the show have new life,
Speaker 3: and I think for me, one of the biggest things
Speaker 3: that I was worried about was, you know, I'm not
Speaker 3: like Eric, who's like a practical effects genius, right Like,
Speaker 3: I'm not like Zach Finnrock, who's like a props master
Speaker 3: who can like make you anything, who can build you
Speaker 3: a freaking District nine robot out of his out of
Speaker 3: legos and spare parts.
Speaker 4: I can't do that stuff. So for me, it was
Speaker 4: you know, what.
Speaker 3: What can I do? You know, I really like Indie
Speaker 3: Mogul and just like how Griffin kind of brought this
Speaker 3: d why kind of documentary angle, what can I bring?
Speaker 3: And I started thinking about it, and I think one
Speaker 3: of the best things of being part of Aperture, and
Speaker 3: we also have we also have dating microphones too. That's
Speaker 3: here too, is that we've been in touch with some
Speaker 3: of the most amazing filmmakers ever. So like you know,
Speaker 3: we go to the AC Awards every year, we know
Speaker 3: all the people that shoot all the big features every
Speaker 3: single year, and I know all the teams that work
Speaker 3: under them too. And I think one of the biggest
Speaker 3: things for me was I had already talked before about hey,
Speaker 3: maybe bringing on those teams to do like an apture video,
Speaker 3: but it's too branded, right, it doesn't make sense.
Speaker 4: So the one thing that I could bring to.
Speaker 3: Mogul is I can bring this network of people that
Speaker 3: I know. And I'm going to tell you right now too,
Speaker 3: and I say this on the show too, But I'm
Speaker 3: not I'm not like a set expert. I'm not a
Speaker 3: lighting technician. I'm not Those people know more than me.
Speaker 3: But what I can do is I can bring someone
Speaker 3: and if you ask me a question, hey, how do
Speaker 3: you do this thing? I can bring someone that's an
Speaker 3: expert about it, and I will happily sit there with
Speaker 3: you and learn because that's my job and I need
Speaker 3: to be in the know about this stuff. So lately
Speaker 3: has been a lot about bringing in we brought out
Speaker 3: like Beetan Papamichael who's the head VP of ACVP, Cortoss
Speaker 3: Ferrari ringing on Launch here, which is Joker. So it's
Speaker 3: just it's now it's become this amazing thing where it's
Speaker 3: half me geeking out and fanboying because I'm sitting next
Speaker 3: to my favorite filmmakers of all time. It's amazing. It's
Speaker 3: half me learning and being able to keep in the know,
Speaker 3: and like when I ask questions on that show. Okay,
Speaker 3: I'm genuinely asking, like, how did you do this? Peeking out? Honestly,
Speaker 3: I think all of the questions I ask on that
Speaker 3: show are like real questions. Now I sit there and
Speaker 3: I get to ask my favorite filmmakers, how did you
Speaker 3: do the thing that you did?
Speaker 2: And I feel you that's exactly That's exactly what I
Speaker 2: do And how I've learned so much doing my show
Speaker 2: is when I ask, when I ask a question, I
Speaker 2: really want to know, like I had when I had
Speaker 2: Russell on, I'm like, so Titanic, Yeah, James Camra, how
Speaker 2: was that you know?
Speaker 3: Yeah? Absolutely? And I think a lot of people look
Speaker 3: at it like it's just this like marketing thing or
Speaker 3: like a money making scheme, And like I'll say right now,
Speaker 3: like Nobel doesn't make it, We really don't make any money.
Speaker 4: All the money that we make those to editors that
Speaker 4: make the show.
Speaker 3: And honestly, the editors that make the show are amazing,
Speaker 3: and I'll say their names right now to twenty in
Speaker 3: Austin are just amazing. And the reason that the show
Speaker 3: is able to exist and that I'm still able to
Speaker 3: do Aperture is because those guys do the heavy lifting.
Speaker 3: Of making the episodes happen. I I spent some time,
Speaker 3: I learned, I get to talk, I get to meet filmmakers,
Speaker 3: and then I'm out, honestly, and those guys put together
Speaker 3: the show and all the episodes that people watch and
Speaker 3: enjoy it. And what that does is it gives me
Speaker 3: the time and the ability to still be a part
Speaker 3: of the appture any team still work together and still
Speaker 3: be able to keep the company together.
Speaker 2: So that's that's amazing, dude. And you've been able to
Speaker 2: accomplish in such a short amount of time, dude, is
Speaker 2: pretty amazing. I mean you you're definitely hustling out there, man,
Speaker 2: And like like I said, hustle, hustle recognizes hustle.
Speaker 3: Man. So I got you. I got you.
Speaker 2: And on a side note, I think I told you
Speaker 2: off air, but I want to say it on air.
Speaker 2: The only light that I used on when shooting on
Speaker 2: the corner of you and the lyre was an aperture light.
Speaker 2: And the few times we was light because we were
Speaker 2: all natural lighting mostly was one little led light and
Speaker 2: we just bounced it off walls and stuff like that,
Speaker 2: and it was great. It was wonderful. It was wonderful.
Speaker 3: Dude, you've got to you gotta let me know about
Speaker 3: like if there's anything in terms of feedback or features
Speaker 3: or anything like that that you need, because that's that's
Speaker 3: literally that's how we make everything now, is it's just
Speaker 3: people tell us a list of stuff. It goes into
Speaker 3: a little list, and then that's what the engineers work on.
Speaker 3: They just work on that list of things. That's like people.
Speaker 3: That's the thing is that most people that make stuff,
Speaker 3: they're not actually on set. And I'm not like the
Speaker 3: engineers aren't on set, you know, So let's just ask
Speaker 3: the people that are on set to tell us what
Speaker 3: the heck they want and then don't make that thing.
Speaker 2: Stop it, stop it. That just makes way too much sense.
Speaker 2: That makes sense, right, Like that would break the easy rule.
Speaker 2: So you don't want to do that. You want to
Speaker 2: break the easy rule. Now, what is the biggest challenge
Speaker 2: you think facing filmmakers today?
Speaker 3: That's a crazy question. Ooh, I think I have a
Speaker 3: slanted view of this stuff, to be honest. Do you
Speaker 3: mean in terms of.
Speaker 2: Just as a challenge, like as a challenge on as
Speaker 2: filmmakers as the industry in general, because look, there's always
Speaker 2: challenges with gear there's always challenges with finding money. There's
Speaker 2: always challenges of making money with a film, Like where
Speaker 2: do you think you feel that the biggest challenge is
Speaker 2: because before, in the eighties and nineties, it was technology.
Speaker 2: Technology was arguably one of the bigger challenges because you
Speaker 2: could just make a movie and it was sold. It's done.
Speaker 2: You accomplished a thirty five millimeter movie, no matter good
Speaker 2: or bad again sold. Today, technology is not really an
Speaker 2: issue anymore, especially with good companies like Aperture and black
Speaker 2: Magic and some other ones that are really affordable, high.
Speaker 3: Quality to make things. Yeah, high quality, super make a movie.
Speaker 2: Absolutely absolutely you could. But in the general, in the
Speaker 2: in the whole industry, I just love to hear your
Speaker 2: perspective on where you think the larger challenge is for
Speaker 2: filmmakers moving forward.
Speaker 3: Let me let me say that's not the problem first,
Speaker 3: and I think I'm moving around on It's nice as
Speaker 3: it loops in the circles. If you ask anyone on
Speaker 3: the high end what's the problem of filmmaking, they're going
Speaker 3: to say. To low end, they're gonna say that that
Speaker 3: that dude down there is taking my gig and shooting
Speaker 3: it for way less and he's taking no money or
Speaker 3: working for free or whatever the heck end. He's ruining
Speaker 3: my industry, right, And I'm sure there's someone listening that
Speaker 3: feels that way. Of course, if you look on the
Speaker 3: low end and you ask them, you know what's the
Speaker 3: problem facing the industry, it's, Oh, those high end people
Speaker 3: won't give me a chance, even though I'm just as
Speaker 3: good as them, and just as technical as them and
Speaker 3: can make something that's just as good. I've heard both
Speaker 3: of these, and I'm gonna be honest, neither is the
Speaker 3: problem here. The times have just changed, man. I'm sorry that. Yes,
Speaker 3: don't me wrong. I'm sure that there's someone out there.
Speaker 3: If you're on the high end, that a low end
Speaker 3: person is cut and taking your gig because some company
Speaker 3: found out, Hey, I can pay a third.
Speaker 4: Of the price and get the commercial somewhere else. I
Speaker 4: get this, But you also got to.
Speaker 3: Realize that we live in a time where the demand
Speaker 3: for content is higher than ever that it's ever been.
Speaker 3: Because of that, there's more jobs and gigs and need
Speaker 3: for video and content, whether it's online digital commercials. And
Speaker 3: I know everyone hates making an Instagram ad in the
Speaker 3: vertical form. I know that everybody hates that, right, but
Speaker 3: those are real content jobs.
Speaker 4: Those are real video gigs that didn't exist before.
Speaker 3: And guess what, most of the people that take those
Speaker 3: jobs are lower end filmmakers, right. So the problem isn't
Speaker 3: each other. And I don't think the problem is that
Speaker 3: there's less jobs in the industry. There's more jobs than ever.
Speaker 3: I think if you're an independent filmmaker and you want
Speaker 3: to do narrative, the problem is marketing, and the problem
Speaker 3: is making a film that actually provides value to somebody.
Speaker 2: We'll be right back after word from our sponsor, and
Speaker 2: now back to the show.
Speaker 3: Marketing isn't the same way that it used to be.
Speaker 3: If you're looking, you're talking about industries that have changed.
Speaker 3: Oh my god, filmmaking and marketing together and changed. If
Speaker 3: you're a filmmaker that doesn't know how to market your.
Speaker 2: Movie, or yourself for that matter.
Speaker 3: Or yourself for that matter, you're you're dead in the water.
Speaker 3: And I think a great example of that is you know,
Speaker 3: I think this year Peanut Butter Falcon came out.
Speaker 2: Yeah, we talked to the.
Speaker 3: DP and the team amazing, so good, and they shout
Speaker 3: it and we're like next to nothing. Man, it didn't
Speaker 3: get into Sanians. It went to south By Southwest instead.
Speaker 3: I know a lot of people are like, yeah, of
Speaker 3: course I went to south By south dude. There's so
Speaker 3: many films that go to south By Southwest and don't
Speaker 3: go anywhere.
Speaker 2: Most most films.
Speaker 3: Go and do go anywhere, right, And I'm sure.
Speaker 4: People are like no, but if you no, no, no, that's
Speaker 4: not the case.
Speaker 3: The problem is that the traditional ways that I've worked
Speaker 3: for marketing, which are you know, festivals. There's people that
Speaker 3: will make it with festivals, but they're not as potent
Speaker 3: as they used to be. It used to be like
Speaker 3: you get into Sundays, so that was your way, and
Speaker 3: it was it was actually it.
Speaker 2: Was a ticket.
Speaker 3: It was a ticket.
Speaker 2: It was it was a gold it was a golden ticket.
Speaker 2: You got into Sundance, you got your movie sold, you
Speaker 2: had a career period.
Speaker 3: And it was possible to get into Sundays because it
Speaker 3: wasn't this like super corporate, high end Hollywood.
Speaker 4: Thing that it is now.
Speaker 3: I'm not saying that it's super super corporate, but I'm
Speaker 3: saying that, you know, a list movie stars are now
Speaker 3: in Sundance movies, which is that's strange, right, that's strange
Speaker 3: and some degree. So you can't look at all these
Speaker 3: traditional You can't look to a PR firm because you
Speaker 3: probably don't have the money. If you're doing an India film,
Speaker 3: you got to look at yourself in terms of social
Speaker 3: media and how can I promote this movie. That's why
Speaker 3: I bring up a peanut butter falcon example, because dude,
Speaker 3: I saw a ridiculous number of advertisements for the peanut
Speaker 3: butter falcon. I saw a ridiculous number of advertisements for
Speaker 3: a parasite that I got targeted on Facebook and on Instagram,
Speaker 3: and I know friends that got targeted those as well.
Speaker 3: I think A twenty four is doing an amazing job
Speaker 3: for social media marketing, and I think there's someone out
Speaker 3: there thinking, oh, then I have to hire a social
Speaker 3: media marketing firm.
Speaker 4: No, dude, learn how to do this.
Speaker 3: Learn. I guarantee that you can learn this, and you
Speaker 3: can probably do this better than a lot of the
Speaker 3: older marketing people out there that don't even have a
Speaker 3: Facebook or don't even have Instagram. If they do, they
Speaker 3: don't know how to use it. I think it's social
Speaker 3: media's kind of the computer of our generation, right. It's
Speaker 3: the thing that gives you an edge over people that
Speaker 3: have way more experience than you were able to use
Speaker 3: it to promote your movie.
Speaker 2: I mean, if you look at every industry throughout time,
Speaker 2: especially in the Industrial Revolution, when electricity was coming around
Speaker 2: and the light bulb was coming around, people were like, no, no,
Speaker 2: that's too dangerous. Kerosene is the future because there was
Speaker 2: an entire kerosene industry ran by Rockefeller, who owned the oil,
Speaker 2: and he was like, no, no, I don't want you to
Speaker 2: mess with my kerosene business. Or when trains came in
Speaker 2: versus horse and buggy, or when the car came in
Speaker 2: horse and buggy, there's always the old the old. The
Speaker 2: old guard does not want to let go of the
Speaker 2: power and the money that they have. And the new
Speaker 2: guard is always the new technology. The new thing is
Speaker 2: always going to win, always, always, always. I mean from
Speaker 2: the the record industry, when the MP three showed up,
Speaker 2: they fought and fought and fought lost one Blockbuster saw Netflix.
Speaker 2: They fought and fought and fought and lost, and you know,
Speaker 2: and it just goes industry and industry and industry and
Speaker 2: a lot of what we're talking about the massive changes
Speaker 2: that have happened in our industry we're talking the last
Speaker 2: basically the last fifteen to twenty years. Basically since basically
Speaker 2: two thousand, it's been like every year it's like exponentially changed.
Speaker 2: I mean when I released my first film, my first
Speaker 2: short in two thousand and five, YouTube had just launched,
Speaker 2: so you know, and there was streaming was like you
Speaker 2: couldn't get Like I remember, YouTube's quality was horrible in
Speaker 2: all of this stuff.
Speaker 3: And oh and I had a lot of filmmakers that
Speaker 3: blew up from those early streams.
Speaker 2: You know, it was like Casey Nistat people, Casey Nystack,
Speaker 2: he was he was the first one. But I have
Speaker 2: to say, because I was telling you, I was going
Speaker 2: to tell you the story of how I should of controls.
Speaker 3: Yes, I want to hear this, Okay.
Speaker 2: So in two thousand and five, when YouTube was a
Speaker 2: year old, maybe it was before pre Google, and I
Speaker 2: created a DVD for my short film Broken that had
Speaker 2: like one hundred visual effect shots in and we shot
Speaker 2: it on a DVX one hundred a Panasonics. It was
Speaker 2: pimp classic with a wide angle adapter. So we had
Speaker 2: a nice oh yeah, the screw on wide angle adapter dude,
Speaker 2: Oh yeah, oh yeah, I was nice two cameras.
Speaker 4: Please give me something that looks like a movie.
Speaker 2: It was twenty four P. You kidding me. It was
Speaker 2: like the first twenty four P camera, not that Canon
Speaker 2: XL crap, like real twenty four P. So we had
Speaker 2: two cameras set up. Then we had we edited on
Speaker 2: a final cut four five something like that, and we
Speaker 2: did our visual effects in shake and we had like
Speaker 2: one hundred visual effects shots in it. And I put
Speaker 2: together a three and a half hour Gorilla film school
Speaker 2: on how we did it because in the marketplace there
Speaker 2: was nothing about how to make an indie film. Nothing.
Speaker 2: There was just no I mean, you had Robert Rodriguez's
Speaker 2: ten hour, ten minute film schools, which is great, Robert,
Speaker 2: and you're making seven eight million dollar movies, not helping me.
Speaker 2: So I wanted to. I wanted to create product that
Speaker 2: could and you know, help filmmakers, independent filmmakers. Even in
Speaker 2: two thousand and five, I started and then I'll tell
Speaker 2: you why I left in a second. So I created
Speaker 2: this and I actually put up tutorials on YouTube which
Speaker 2: are still on YouTube. You can go back and check them.
Speaker 2: And I would have kept going and if I would
Speaker 2: have opened up a channel and I would have kept
Speaker 2: creating more of these tutorials on how to do it.
Speaker 2: I would have owned everything. I would have been the everyone.
Speaker 2: But then this is where this nasty thing called the
Speaker 2: ego shows up. And the ego said, no, no, no,
Speaker 2: you are a filmmaker. You are not an educator. You're
Speaker 2: not a teacher. You're a filmmaker. Why would you teach?
Speaker 2: Why would you want to teach? And then I went
Speaker 2: off and stopped doing it, and then it took me
Speaker 2: ten years to come back to twenty fifteen and I
Speaker 2: opened up Indie film Muscle. During those ten years, I
Speaker 2: would have Can you imagine, dude, can you imagine if
Speaker 2: I would have started making short it would I would
Speaker 2: have I would have owned everybody. It would be a
Speaker 2: completely different conversation. But they are still up there. I
Speaker 2: got like five or six of those videos that are
Speaker 2: still up there and their little tutorials and how we
Speaker 2: did stuff, and there was just nothing else up there.
Speaker 2: So that's how I that That's the one of the
Speaker 2: many close calls, dude.
Speaker 3: I think you know, at the end of the day,
Speaker 3: it always comes down to what if you're working on
Speaker 3: and taking it really seriously, dude, I can say the
Speaker 3: same thing about my time after. I didn't expect to
Speaker 3: be here this long, dude, and you just don't know,
Speaker 3: You never know. You got to put you got to
Speaker 3: take everything seriously that you do. And believe me, I
Speaker 3: feel the same way about like but with the one
Speaker 3: thing about is that it's never too late. That's another
Speaker 3: excuse that people say all the time, I missed my
Speaker 3: golden window. I know people that, uh, you know, that's
Speaker 3: a lot of the reason why people don't start channels
Speaker 3: or they don't start in Instagram.
Speaker 2: It's gonna take it's gonna take too long. It's gonna
Speaker 2: take too long. And the same look. The same thing
Speaker 2: happened with me with indie Filmhoussole. I started in twenty fifteen.
Speaker 2: There was an other podcast going on at the time.
Speaker 2: I mean, I'm not the first indie film podcast, yeah,
Speaker 2: but I'm the most I'm the most prolific.
Speaker 3: You know.
Speaker 2: I got almost four hundred episodes of Justice One podcast
Speaker 2: because I just kept pounding it, and all of a sudden,
Speaker 2: by just this daily and weekly pounding it and grinding,
Speaker 2: all of a sudden, you look back and go, oh
Speaker 2: my god, I'm almost at four hundred, and.
Speaker 3: You get it.
Speaker 2: Yeah, and then but you have to start. You have
Speaker 2: to start like I turned out. I woke up one
Speaker 2: day at forty one, almost forty one, at forty and
Speaker 2: I said to myself, I have not made my feature
Speaker 2: film yet, and I can't do this anymore. I'm not
Speaker 2: twenty five. I gotta go out and make it. And
Speaker 2: thirty days later I was shooting my first feature. Yeah,
Speaker 2: that's simple. Not because it's like, oh I need this,
Speaker 2: I need that. No, we just got to go out
Speaker 2: and do it. And if it's good or bad, irrelevant,
Speaker 2: you learn, you move on, you keep going. I would
Speaker 2: rather make ten bad movies then wait ten years to
Speaker 2: make one good one, you know what, because I'll learn more.
Speaker 3: Because if it takes you ten years to make every
Speaker 3: movie too, you are not in business.
Speaker 2: You're Kubrick Kuberg is the only one that can make
Speaker 2: that work.
Speaker 3: And even Kopbrick has practiced. He practiced it, you know,
Speaker 3: and he was able to do this. Yes, I you know,
Speaker 3: it's the same thing my brother works, said Amazon, and
Speaker 3: people are I'm sure listening there, like does Amazon have
Speaker 3: to do with filmmaking? One of the number one rules
Speaker 3: at any tech company. And the reason I had to
Speaker 3: study this too. Is because I run a tech company.
Speaker 3: Is you have to throw out your first draft as
Speaker 3: quickly as possible. You have to get it done as
Speaker 3: quickly as possible. And that is the hardest, most painful
Speaker 3: thing in the world to do, is to throw out
Speaker 3: this like half baked idea, especially with art, because it's
Speaker 3: like some reflection of your soul. And I'm sure that
Speaker 3: if you're listening, you've probably told a lot of people
Speaker 3: I'm a filmmaker. I'm a filmmaker. I'm a filmmaker. Which
Speaker 3: is why that when you show someone a movie that's
Speaker 3: bad and you and they watch it and they're like, oh,
Speaker 3: this is bad. But this person has been telling me
Speaker 3: his entire life that this is the thing he's born
Speaker 3: to do. I get that, right. That is horribly.
Speaker 4: Faful, is fairly painful thing in the world.
Speaker 3: Right, It's hard to say I'm born to be an
Speaker 3: actor and then be a put on a bad performance.
Speaker 4: But at the same time, you're never going to do
Speaker 4: anything and.
Speaker 3: Just start throwing stuff out there.
Speaker 4: Man, And like Amazon does this, tech companies do this.
Speaker 4: You throw out a horrible, bad idea in the beginning.
Speaker 2: We'll be right back after a word from our sponsor,
Speaker 2: and now back to the show.
Speaker 3: And then you reiterate. And the faster you can start reiterating,
Speaker 3: the faster you can start practicing, the better that results.
Speaker 3: I mean, I would say Muggle is doing the same
Speaker 3: thing too. When we first started, we were like, we
Speaker 3: have no idea what this is going to look like.
Speaker 3: Let's just start making stuff.
Speaker 4: And then you start to realize, figure it out.
Speaker 3: What can I do long term? What actually makes sense?
Speaker 3: What is fun? What's enjoyable? Where's that balance? Everything's a balanced.
Speaker 2: I actually talk about it in my book about the
Speaker 2: ten thousand We all heard about the ten thousand hours
Speaker 2: that Malcolm Gladwell said, of course, but the argument was
Speaker 2: that there's a new thing. It's not ten thousand hours
Speaker 2: to learn one skill. It's the ten thousand experiments. So
Speaker 2: you have to keep doing it and doing it and
Speaker 2: doing it because you learn more from trying and failing
Speaker 2: than you do from just training to do the one
Speaker 2: thing again and again and again. And example is Zuckerberg
Speaker 2: says that at any one time, there's ten thousand versions
Speaker 2: of Facebook going on every day, that the algorithm is
Speaker 2: constantly as shifting, it's changing, They're trying new things. That's
Speaker 2: why in Amazon's the same way. There's like I mean
Speaker 2: to get what Amazon has done and honed in. It's
Speaker 2: taken decades of just tightening and tweaking, and every inch
Speaker 2: of that screen has been thought about a ten thousand
Speaker 2: times and where you know, to the point where now
Speaker 2: you don't even think about it, like you I forget
Speaker 2: that I could buy something locally because it's so easy
Speaker 2: to buy it on Amazon, you know. And I studied
Speaker 2: tech companies a lot because of they are the new Rockefellers,
Speaker 2: Carnegie there. They are the giants, the titans are of
Speaker 2: this time, which is the information age. And then I'm
Speaker 2: trying to bring as much of that information and knowledge
Speaker 2: to the film industry because yeah, and because most filmmakers
Speaker 2: don't even think about business, and unfortunately this is a business.
Speaker 3: It is, And who is spending the most money on business?
Speaker 3: And what is the most efficient work process? Tech companies,
Speaker 3: So how are they doing it? Because there's some method
Speaker 3: to the badness, and the method is iterate as quickly
Speaker 3: as you can just start throwing things out there. And
Speaker 3: I think it's harder in art than and tech, because
Speaker 3: tech you can be like, hey, I read this quick
Speaker 3: prototype very do. Look at this kind of sucks, but
Speaker 3: it'll be something someday, right, Yeah, it's a lot easier
Speaker 3: to do that than just someone you're bad writing and
Speaker 3: your bad movie. But I don't know any way around this.
Speaker 2: But you know what, just look, I love the Room.
Speaker 2: I think The Room is one of the greater films
Speaker 2: of all time. Maybe not for the reasons that Timmy
Speaker 2: was so thinking it was the greatest films of all times,
Speaker 2: but I personally think the Room there's always something for somebody.
Speaker 4: How are you approaching this? Are you talking about like
Speaker 4: you love it.
Speaker 3: In a way of like he threw something out there
Speaker 3: as quickly as possible.
Speaker 2: No, no, no, no. If you want to have this
Speaker 2: conversation about the Room, I can have this conversation about
Speaker 2: the Room because I love the Room and I am
Speaker 2: not ashamed of it. I think I'm one of many
Speaker 2: millions of people who love the Room. The reason I
Speaker 2: love the Room so much is one Tommy Wisseau is
Speaker 2: our modern day ed Wood, where there is so much
Speaker 2: passion and delusion in his filmmaking process that all he
Speaker 2: sees is his art form. It's not obviously an art
Speaker 2: form that anybody else saw because he was like literally
Speaker 2: having sex with someone's belly in the middle of a
Speaker 2: sex scene. There's, you know, and multiple other millions of
Speaker 2: things that went on in the room that you know
Speaker 2: when we were shooting, uh, when we were shooting. So
Speaker 2: when we're shooting on the corner of Eagle Desire at
Speaker 2: Sun Dance, all of my crew and all of the
Speaker 2: actors had never seen the room. So one night we're like,
Speaker 2: you know, we're breaking I'm like, okay, guys, we're watching
Speaker 2: the room. So we go online and we rent it
Speaker 2: and we start watching it. And you can't watch the
Speaker 2: room by yourself. You have to watch it with somebody
Speaker 2: else because if not, it's just weird. I can't watch
Speaker 2: the room by myself. I need another filmmaker. I need
Speaker 2: somebody else to like, you can, did you just see
Speaker 2: what I saw?
Speaker 3: Banter and to chat and be like then and I.
Speaker 2: Would sit there and we were watching it, and you
Speaker 2: just see people going, why is there?
Speaker 3: Why?
Speaker 2: What's going why is it? The same stock footage from
Speaker 2: San Francisco, What's going on? I'd like, what is it?
Speaker 2: He's talking to a dog? What is like? There's so
Speaker 2: why is there? Pictures of spoons what is happening, Like
Speaker 2: it's so bad that has transcended good, Like there are
Speaker 2: movies that are just bad to be bad, sack Like
Speaker 2: I saw that documentary about the worst film ever made,
Speaker 2: Troll two, which is an amazing documentary, and then I
Speaker 2: went to watch Troll True. I can't troll to his
Speaker 2: horror like it's so bad, it's just I felt a
Speaker 2: little bit of my soul die when I saw that film.
Speaker 2: But the room, there's so much passion and love behind
Speaker 2: the filmmaker that did it, and I know people who
Speaker 2: worked on the crew. By the way, Yeah, it is
Speaker 2: as crazy as he is, as as delusional as Tommy
Speaker 2: was when he was making it, And it's stupid as
Speaker 2: the way the filmmaking process was was shooting it on video,
Speaker 2: on HD and on film and all the craziness that happened.
Speaker 2: The passion of his vision spills off the screen in
Speaker 2: a way that you can't like. It's not manufactured, it's authentic.
Speaker 2: And that's what people are reacting to in the room
Speaker 2: is the authenticity of his insanity is what people Because
Speaker 2: we've all seen bad movies, We've all seen movies that
Speaker 2: are just so bad. You're like, I can't. Why is
Speaker 2: this is just bad cinema? Like why did someone waste
Speaker 2: time with this? When you see the Room, there's just
Speaker 2: something magical about it that you just go this can't
Speaker 2: be like because he's serious, because if he was not
Speaker 2: serious about it, and he was inside the joke, it
Speaker 2: wouldn't work. But he really felt like he was making this.
Speaker 2: He really felt like he was making a masterpiece. And
Speaker 2: when everyone laughed at the and the premiere, he was like, oh,
Speaker 2: I meant to make a comedy. No you didn't, but
Speaker 2: that's okay. And and look where it got him, Like
Speaker 2: you know, he's blown up and he's international. He's still
Speaker 2: making millions of dollars a year off of this, this
Speaker 2: little movie that is horrible. But I loved it. And
Speaker 2: you're gonna, by the way, you're gonna see a cameo
Speaker 2: from someone from the Room in on the corner of
Speaker 2: Egan desire. I'll leave it at that.
Speaker 3: Oh my gosh, oh my god, send me send me
Speaker 3: this link.
Speaker 4: This is like Coelus ridiculous.
Speaker 3: Uh, you know, I I will, I will I watch
Speaker 3: The Room again at some point, and I'll be sure
Speaker 3: to remember.
Speaker 2: You have to watch it with friends. You got to
Speaker 2: watch it with friends. If there's alcohol, if there's alcohol
Speaker 2: in play, it's even better. You know, if you can
Speaker 2: watch it at sundance, even better. These are the things.
Speaker 2: But it's so it just transcends. Like you watch ed
Speaker 2: Wood and you watch like Panna nine from out of Space,
Speaker 2: you just go, you there's there's so much love behind it,
Speaker 2: Like it's there's just so much insanity. Did you ever
Speaker 2: see ed Wood? The movie Tim Burton's movie Edwood?
Speaker 4: I don't think I have that, dude.
Speaker 2: You okay, okay, okay, your homework assignment's ted. You need
Speaker 2: to obviously watch the obviously watching myself, you watching it,
Speaker 2: obviously watching movie. But after you watch my movie, you've
Speaker 2: got to watch ed Wood. Tim Burton's Edwood. Any filmmaker, yes,
Speaker 2: will cry in that movie because you could just see
Speaker 2: the love and the love and the insanity, the insanity
Speaker 2: of him. And he has to wear his Angora sweaters
Speaker 2: and like and the carnival crew of people that he
Speaker 2: brought around him like his like one of my favorite
Speaker 2: scenes in the movie. And you'll appreciate this. It's all
Speaker 2: shot in black and white, but he comes up and
Speaker 2: the the the the costume designer comes up and like,
Speaker 2: what dress do you want her to wear? Do you
Speaker 2: want to wear the red one or the blue one?
Speaker 2: And then uh, Johnny Depp who's playing Edwood, goes it,
Speaker 2: gets the DP to come over and the dps, you know,
Speaker 2: some old, really old DP, and he goes which one
Speaker 2: will work better in the movie. He's like, I don't know,
Speaker 2: I'm colorblind. And then then Johnny's like, well the red one.
Speaker 2: It is all right, let's move on. Like he doesn't
Speaker 2: nothing stop nothing, like he like one of the actors,
Speaker 2: bumps into the bumps into a wall. The whole damn
Speaker 2: set shakes, and he's like, cut perfect, prit Let's move on,
Speaker 2: And everyone's like no, and I mean, should we do
Speaker 2: another take? Why that was perfect? He was so crazy
Speaker 2: and delusional. It's like you, there's certain human beings, there
Speaker 2: are certain artists that could do things like that, and
Speaker 2: there once in a generation. I feel that Tommy was
Speaker 2: so is one of those guys. He can't do it again,
Speaker 2: Like he can't recreate that, he can't make another movie.
Speaker 2: He's trying to make others, but he can't do that
Speaker 2: anymore because he understands what's going on. So he it's
Speaker 2: just never gonna happen again. That movie is such a
Speaker 2: unique snapshot in time that will live with us arguably forever.
Speaker 2: It's it is fascinating.
Speaker 3: I can see that in that in that view of art,
Speaker 3: I can see how that is an eternal, once in
Speaker 3: a lifetime movie.
Speaker 2: Just you can't read. I couldn't remake that if I tried,
Speaker 2: Like if I wanted to go out and make a
Speaker 2: movie badly enough, because I would know the joke. I
Speaker 2: would know the joke, and you would too.
Speaker 3: Self aware, it's not funny. It's Rebecca Black's Friday, right, Like, yeah,
Speaker 3: it has to be. It has to be earnest for
Speaker 3: it to be as funny as it is.
Speaker 2: Yeah, exactly, that's what makes it work. We've gone completely
Speaker 2: off topic, but this is fine.
Speaker 3: I think everyone.
Speaker 2: I think everyone's enjoyed it, all right. I mean we
Speaker 2: could keep talking for hours. Brother, But let me ask
Speaker 2: you a few questions. I ask all of my guests,
Speaker 2: what advice would you give a filmmaker wanting to break
Speaker 2: into the business today.
Speaker 3: I think outside the Box is everything that someone everything
Speaker 3: that's worked for someone that is twenty thirty years older
Speaker 3: than you. I don't think it's going to work for
Speaker 3: you because the time's changed so quickly, and it's every right.
Speaker 2: I appreciate it, dude, it's not nineteen ninety one. You
Speaker 2: are not Robert Rodriguez. We'll be right back after a
Speaker 2: word from our sponsor, and now back to the show.
Speaker 2: It's not gonna happen that way anymore, guys. It's the
Speaker 2: way it works, a different way like YouTube.
Speaker 3: That's what I mean by the research and things that
Speaker 3: you're doing right now, and you're I guarantee people are researching.
Speaker 3: They research the way that old people made it. It's
Speaker 3: not gonna be the way that you're gonna make it.
Speaker 3: I'm sorry, it's just not The industry is changing too much.
Speaker 3: Try something new, do it earnestly, put all of your
Speaker 3: effort into it, and just see what happens, and you
Speaker 3: might be surprised.
Speaker 2: It could fall flat on its face, or you can
Speaker 2: have the room. Okay, are those the only two options
Speaker 2: we have? I really is that it. I mean it
Speaker 2: could be really bad or it could be the room.
Speaker 2: I don't know. That's really now.
Speaker 3: What is horribly hard, man. I mean everyone listening to
Speaker 3: this knows this, but it's just like it's tough out there. Man.
Speaker 2: Look everyone, if anyone listens to my podcast understands how
Speaker 2: I mean. I've I've given a lot of tough love
Speaker 2: conversations and tough love episodes where I'm like, you know,
Speaker 2: follow your dream, but don't be an idiot. You know,
Speaker 2: and and you know, and and all My work is
Speaker 2: about trying to break down the realities of the film
Speaker 2: business while still being supportive, while still being motivative, while
Speaker 2: still trying to educate them. And like I'm saying it's impossible,
Speaker 2: I'm saying it's going to be harder than you've ever imagined.
Speaker 2: But I'm going to show you, at least from my perspective,
Speaker 2: tools that can help you on that path, you know.
Speaker 3: Like you know, one of the things that I like
Speaker 3: to think is like, if you were doing this in
Speaker 3: any other industry, would this be a waste of time? Yes, sir,
Speaker 3: Like if you if you spent five years working on
Speaker 3: a screenplay. Let's just pretend like Ellen has this weird thing,
Speaker 3: coffee shops has this thing.
Speaker 2: No, it's got this coffee shops, final drafting, coffee shops. Yeah,
Speaker 2: I get it, I get.
Speaker 3: Yes, absolutely, it's got this this way of making wasting
Speaker 3: your time seem like a normal thing to do, and
Speaker 3: you you can't fall into that, into that vagueness. You
Speaker 3: can't fall into that that lazy river, because you'll sit
Speaker 3: in the lazy river forever. And one of the things
Speaker 3: that helps is if you're not from that city, go
Speaker 3: home and just just look around and be like if
Speaker 3: I lived in you know, from Baltimore. So I'll say Baltimore.
Speaker 3: I lived in Baltimore and I spent five years working
Speaker 3: on something. How would people view me?
Speaker 2: They do?
Speaker 3: You as a bomb.
Speaker 4: I'm sorry they would view you as a bomb.
Speaker 3: But for some reason, when you're in La and you
Speaker 3: tell somebody working on your screenplay for five years, and
Speaker 3: they're like, oh, it must be really good. Just don't
Speaker 3: let yourself fall into that. Look at it like you're
Speaker 3: looking at it like any other job.
Speaker 2: Seriously, do it must be it must be really good.
Speaker 3: It's but like, let's let's just assume, like you know, okay,
Speaker 3: Like say you did want to work and you want
Speaker 3: to be like a lawyer or something, and you just
Speaker 3: said like, oh, I'm just like studying this for the
Speaker 3: Bible contract for five years.
Speaker 4: It's like what, so you you're a bomb.
Speaker 3: It's like you gotta treat you, gotta be that cutthroat
Speaker 3: about it. You can't just say, oh, because I'm in
Speaker 3: the film industry, this is okay. It's it's it's not okay.
Speaker 3: And I don't mean this to say this as a bummer,
Speaker 3: because I'm sure someone's like, man, that really bummed me up. No,
Speaker 3: I'm not trying to say that. I'm just it's easier
Speaker 3: to say things that are nice and like everything's fine.
Speaker 3: It is harder to say things like you need to
Speaker 3: get your you need to get your stuff together, because
Speaker 3: that means that we actually care. And that's the only
Speaker 3: reason why I'm saying this is because I do actually
Speaker 3: care for this poor soul out there that's lost in
Speaker 3: the La river of screenplays and coffee shops. It's a
Speaker 3: horrible situation.
Speaker 2: Like I always say, anytime I jump into an uber,
Speaker 2: I always go, so, how's the screenplay going, and to go,
Speaker 2: how'd you know?
Speaker 4: No, that's so mean.
Speaker 2: No, No, it's either how the screen how's the screenplay going?
Speaker 2: How's the screenplay going? Or how is the castle call?
Speaker 2: It's one of those two, and it's and it's and
Speaker 2: it's sad, but it's true. And I'm not trying to look.
Speaker 2: We all have the hustle. We all got to do
Speaker 2: our things. I'm making a joke, but you know, if
Speaker 2: if anything, I've done more than enough to help the community.
Speaker 2: So I can occasional joke. It's okay.
Speaker 3: You're doing it for like six months or something like that. That's different.
Speaker 2: No, No, looks like you know the duplus brothers, right,
Speaker 2: of course, Mark and j Right. So the du Plus brothers.
Speaker 2: When they first got back from sun Dance with the
Speaker 2: puffy Chair, they were the toast of the town. So
Speaker 2: they went on the water bottle tour, you know, the
Speaker 2: water bottle too, around to all the agencies and all
Speaker 2: the studios in the lounge and given a water bottle,
Speaker 2: and you just and you meet with everybody, and you meet,
Speaker 2: you meet everybody like, we want to work with you.
Speaker 2: I want to work with you. What's your project, let's
Speaker 2: put it up, let's get in development. And a year
Speaker 2: goes by and they go, we haven't made anything. So
Speaker 2: they decided to call up their agents and say we're
Speaker 2: not taking any more meetings. And they're like, but that's
Speaker 2: the way this town runs. You've got to take meetings.
Speaker 2: They're like, nope, We're gonna go make stuff. Sorry, Yeah,
Speaker 2: and it worked out okay.
Speaker 3: For stuff, call make stuff and they will call it's
Speaker 3: it's uh. You know. When I was think commercials, all
Speaker 3: the same thing was. It was never because you had
Speaker 3: a great meeting. It was always because they watched something
Speaker 3: they liked and they were like, can you make And
Speaker 3: let's be real, it's always can you make this again?
Speaker 3: But for us and cheaper? Yeah, for sure. Yeah, if
Speaker 3: you're lucky though, like maybe we'll make it a little
Speaker 3: bit nice if you're lucky, you know, really lucky. Yeah.
Speaker 3: It always comes from what you do. What you do
Speaker 3: creates more action, for sure.
Speaker 2: When you were doing commercials, didn't you love when they said,
Speaker 2: you go out and you bid a job for like,
Speaker 2: you know, puppies, there's going to be a horse in
Speaker 2: the shot and the like, but there's no horses on
Speaker 2: your reel. Dude, it's a horse. I don't need to
Speaker 2: pull a performance from the horse, are you kidding? Minds?
Speaker 2: Was dialogue? I had done all non dialogue stuff. I
Speaker 2: had no one's speaking, because commercials you don't have to speak,
Speaker 2: you know, And everyone's like, but how do you We
Speaker 2: don't know if you can direct actors like can you
Speaker 2: get I'm like, guys, this is not Godfather man. It's like, hey, iPhone, Like,
Speaker 2: it's not like it's three lines, guys, are you kidding me?
Speaker 3: It's people that are scared of looking down in front
Speaker 3: of their bosses. Right, some some see some see some
Speaker 3: great execs somewhere is like is holding on for dear life?
Speaker 3: Being like, if I just keep working this job for
Speaker 3: forty years, I'll be a head and head of creative
Speaker 3: at one of these places. But I just can't get
Speaker 3: fired in the meanwhile. So they want to recommend the
Speaker 3: safest option every single time, just in.
Speaker 2: Case, just in case you, as a director screw up.
Speaker 2: I'm like, well, everything on paper looked okay, it's not my.
Speaker 3: Friend, and I picked the exact guy that has lots
Speaker 3: of horse stuff on his reel and he did the
Speaker 3: horse thing for a horse commercial.
Speaker 4: There was no one could flame me for this decision. Truly,
Speaker 4: there was no one better.
Speaker 2: No one better. I mean, he is the horse guy.
Speaker 2: Like it's like, oh Jesus, all right, what is the
Speaker 2: lesson that took you the longest to learn, whether in
Speaker 2: the film business or in life.
Speaker 3: I'm still learning this lesson, but fail fast everyone's heard this.
Speaker 3: Everybody has heard this. You don't really understand what it means.
Speaker 3: You don't understand what it means. You think fail fast
Speaker 3: means like write a first draft and then like look
Speaker 3: at it again tomorrow. No, I mean like, write something
Speaker 3: that's awful and show it to a lot of people,
Speaker 3: and you gotta you gotta get used to that.
Speaker 4: And I don't care what industry you're in.
Speaker 3: I don't care if you're a writer, if you're a filmmaker,
Speaker 3: if you're a cinematographer, Go shoot something horrible and stand
Speaker 3: next to it and be like, this is the thing
Speaker 3: that I made.
Speaker 4: It's so hard, but just do.
Speaker 3: It earlier than later. Get used to that feeling, feel
Speaker 3: comfortable in that feeling. It's something that like I wake
Speaker 3: up every day and again, you know, these days I'm
Speaker 3: doing I'm doing more company running the stuff. So I
Speaker 3: make probably five decisions that I regret every day, and
Speaker 3: you have to go back on them and say, you
Speaker 3: know what we tried, because you can't just do the
Speaker 3: same thing all the time. Although you're not going to
Speaker 3: go anywhere.
Speaker 2: Right, Very very good advice, sir. Now, what was the
Speaker 2: biggest fear you had to overcome to make your very
Speaker 2: first film.
Speaker 3: Oh man, I don't know if I'm a great person
Speaker 3: to ask this question too.
Speaker 2: Because your fearlessener? Are you fearless?
Speaker 3: No?
Speaker 4: No, I don't think that. You think, well, one mother
Speaker 4: question was the greatest fear.
Speaker 2: Yeah, the greatest fear you had to overcome to make
Speaker 2: your first fear, to make your first project, to shoot
Speaker 2: your first thing.
Speaker 3: It's just looking dumb. Yeah, everyone's afraid of that, right.
Speaker 3: It's it's scary to say this is the thing I'm
Speaker 3: born to do and then make something bad. It's like, well,
Speaker 3: what were you born for? Then?
Speaker 2: That's literally what that's because you've attached your personality to
Speaker 2: your job or to your career.
Speaker 3: What I'm born to do? Look at this thing, it's mediocre.
Speaker 3: Was I born for a mediocre reason? No, it's people
Speaker 3: feel that way and they're taking that way, suf. Just
Speaker 3: to be careful.
Speaker 2: We'll be right back after a word from our sponsor,
Speaker 2: and now back to the show and three of your
Speaker 2: favorite films of all time.
Speaker 3: I hate this question. I actually asked this question for
Speaker 3: your team members as a joke, and we just like
Speaker 3: because because I feel like, no matter what answer you give,
Speaker 3: everyone either they either get or they just rail into
Speaker 3: you excited that My new answer to this question is
Speaker 3: rat of two and all movies are based on the
Speaker 3: ratom two B scale. Does the movie have a rat
Speaker 3: in it? It's a six out of ten? Got it?
Speaker 3: The movie cooking in it? It's a seven out of ten.
Speaker 3: The rat cooks it's a nine out of ten. And
Speaker 3: if it's a there's a lot of zeros on this list.
Speaker 3: But what are you talking about? We can talk about
Speaker 3: lists of movies on robers Okay, fair enough, like a
Speaker 3: lot of movies I don't like.
Speaker 2: So where can people find you and what you're doing online?
Speaker 3: Yeah? Absolutely anyone that cares about technology and gear. And
Speaker 3: again I say this and fully standing by all the
Speaker 3: stuff that I say about your research to be procrastination.
Speaker 3: For some people, it's also just their true and deep love.
Speaker 3: They really love gear, and honestly, there is a part
Speaker 3: of me that really does love the technology behind it.
Speaker 3: It's fun. So Aberatur is probably the easiest place for that.
Speaker 3: And then Indie Mogul, of course, is where we're just
Speaker 3: having fun, hanging out learning about filmmaking, and I am
Speaker 3: learning along just at everybody else, bringing on people I
Speaker 3: think a lot of the guests that we bring on
Speaker 3: our recommendations from people that watch so Indie Mogul as
Speaker 3: well too, where I brought on YouTube. We have a
Speaker 3: podcast as well to.
Speaker 2: Very cool brother. Thank you so much for coming on, man.
Speaker 2: I know we could talk for at least another four
Speaker 2: or five hours, but you're busy man, and I got
Speaker 2: things to do as well. But I do appreciate it.
Speaker 2: I would love to have you back sometime. And it
Speaker 2: was it was great man, So thanks for being on
Speaker 2: the show.
Speaker 3: Brother, Yeah, it was fun. Thanks, I appreciate it.
Speaker 2: I want to thank that for coming on the show
Speaker 2: and dropping those major knowledge bombs on the Indie film
Speaker 2: muscle Tribe today. Thank you so so much, Ted for
Speaker 2: the good work you're doing over at Aperture and at
Speaker 2: Indie Mogul. If you want links to anything we spoke
Speaker 2: about in this episode, head over to the show notes
Speaker 2: at Bulletproof Screenwriting dot tv. Forward slash three ninety six.
Speaker 2: Thank you so much for listening to guys as always,
Speaker 2: keep on writing no matter what. I'll talk to you soon.
Speaker 1: Thanks for listening to the Bulletproof Screenwriting podcast at Bulletproof
Speaker 1: Screenwriting dot tv.