The World Needs Building
It's been a while since my last letter. Five months to be exact. I've had a lot of life changes recently (all good stuff, thankfully). I haven’t really had a moment to sit down and write. Well, maybe I have, but I guess I’ve just let other things take priority.
In recent news, I’ve re-discovered my love for making videos. I think when you do something for so long, things can begin to feel repetitive. That’s why I’ve enjoyed making 3D content over the last few years. It felt fresh. It felt challenging. A huge portion of my projects these days involve working with 3D software. I truly enjoy the work I do, but there’s there’s something that happened to me last year that has caused a feeling of discomfort. This feeling has been bugging me all year.
Let me give you some context…
At the end of last year, I wrote, directed, and shot my first 30-minute short. I spent a lot of time in pre-production, had a crew of people signed on to help, and the first two days of production went great! (or so I thought…)
Long story short, I ran into some issues with the audio, unfortunately. I had rented a Zoom F6 audio recorder to record and mix the audio throughout each scene. I even hired an audio tech to run the equipment for me on set. I offloaded all the footage after the second day of shooting and my heart dropped.
No audio was recorded. Just static noise. All I had to show for this short film was a bunch of beautiful-looking frames and an in-camera backup audio track that I planned on using to sync timecodes and dialogue. But the backup audio was akin to a rattling tin can in a fishbowl. If you’ve ever made films before, you know bad audio is an instant killer. There was no way I could edit something together with such poor sound. It was well below my standards.
I was devastated for a while… It was going to be impossible to reshoot any time soon. I had wasted the actor’s and crew’s time. I had a buddy drive 4 hours to come help me shoot this. I only had 2 days to shoot in the location we had borrowed, and my time expired. I didn’t even have the budget to reshoot at the time.
Something seemingly so simple, went overlooked.
The crew around me told me it wasn’t my fault; they said the audio recorder was faulty or blamed the audio guy for not doing his job properly. But at the end of the day, I knew deep down that it was my fault. I was in charge of the shoot, I was the director. I was shooting the film. I should’ve tested the audio equipment before the shoot days. I shouldn’t have trusted someone else to handle something so important without doing my own due diligence first.
It was my responsibility to make sure I had everything sorted before ever setting foot on set.
Sometimes, it is through moments like these where you learn the most.
I can promise you that this is a mistake I will never make again.
And to be completely honest, this incident made me not want to pick up a camera for a bit. I was disheartened. I decided to just focus on my other interests. I was getting more work creating animations and graphic design anyways, so I just decided to stop making videos for a few months.
I spent a lot of my time creating projects for other people, bringing their visions to life. Creating design systems for brands, creating 3D worlds for music artists to showcase their newest song, and helping businesses establish a digital presence through building SEO ranking websites. I’m grateful to have the opportunity to work in a creative field for a living. But selfishly, I didn’t feel like I was doing enough for myself.
This feeling of discomfort kept coming back, no matter how hard I tried to suppress it.
I yearned to create something for myself. To create something free from restrictions or client expectations.
More specifically, I yearned for the process of creating something tangible, completely from my own imagination.
But my last attempt at doing this had failed and I had nothing to show for it.
I decided to combat this realization by working with non-video mediums! Mainly in the form of personal 3D animation projects, which was fulfilling to a certain extent. I was sketching out ideas and modeling complex scenes with my own characters, environments, and style. People loved what I was making! I was receiving dozens of DMs each week from people who wanted to hire me.
Over the next few months, I was able to quit my day job and transition into working full time as a creative.
From the outside, my life looked great.
But deep down, I knew that I needed to finish what I had started last year. I needed to pick up the camera again. I needed to stop feeling sorry for myself over a failed project.
I needed to fall in love with filmmaking again.
So I picked up the camera and started shooting, just like I did when I was sixteen years old with my Canon 50D.
I recorded my friends and I hanging out, without pressure to create the next Sundance indie short.
I recorded the behind the scenes process of my projects.
I began reading daily about the technical aspects of digital imaging, camera lenses, and lighting.
I’ve been running camera tests daily over the past few weeks to push the limits of my 6-year-old camera.
I’ve since rekindled the spark for filmmaking I once had not too long ago.
And I made the conscious decision to start making films again.
You may be wondering why I didn’t just reshoot last year’s short. And that’s a valid question. I think somewhere down the line I will. It’s difficult to explain, but sometimes things align in such a way that is conducive for the creation of a specific piece of work. At the time, everything felt aligned - actor availability, budget, location, etc…
But since then, one thing has fallen out of alignment. And that is my attachment to the original story. It was a story that I needed to tell at that specific point in my life. To put it simply, I just don’t have the desire to pour further time into a project I no longer identify with.
The time for that piece to be created has passed.
And that’s completely okay.
Somewhere along my journey I may want to re tell that story. But for now, I’m moving on to bigger and better things.
And finally, after what feels like an eternity, I’ve started writing a new short film. And I feel like this one’s going to be better than the last.
Thank you for reading my Thursday night’s stream of consciousness.
I guess it’s only fair that I leave you with something.
Here’s the biggest takeaway I’ve learned from this whole experience:
The greatest act a person can partake in is creation - the process and the final result.
To create the tangible from the intangible is arguably the greatest gift that life has to offer. From something as simple as a freshly painted canvas to something as complex as the birth of a newborn, creation is what makes us feel alive.
I believe this desire to create is within you, me, and everyone else on this planet.
If you shy away from this, I can guarantee you will experience feelings of anxiety or confusion.
So instead, lean into this desire.
Find what you want to create, and bring it to life.
It doesn’t matter if you are a mechanic, a sculptor, a scientist, or a writer; pick up your tools and get to work.
The world needs building.
-P