Hey folks,
My name is Dan, I run a couple of videography businesses in Marquette Michigan. I like shooting video, but independent film is my true love. During the Summer of 2001 I decided to learn about the movie business by buying a 3CCD camcorder (the SONY TRV900) writing a script, and shooting a movie.

Well . . . turns out the process is a little harder than that. I didn't have enough actors locally to fill all the parts, so I recruited a few local high school actors. I didn't draw a scene by scene shot list for the script, so the camera work was . . hmmm . . dull! I wasn't wearing earphones so a few of the scenes have really loud buzzes from gas-station coolers, or steam pipe lines that nearly drowns out the dialogue.

There were no rehearsals, so my actors often did not know their lines . . . which meant we spent about 6 to 8 hours filming a ten minute scene. I didn't handle the lighting very well (hey, how was I supposed to know that bouncing 1000 watts of halogen light on an actor would over-expose them?). We recorded a total twelve hours worth of footage, of which about an hour and a half was usable for the movie.

Other than that things went pretty well. The movie is done, it's called 'Passage of Four'. You'd have to pay me enormous amounts of money to see it. You see, I'm going to be huge one day, and I don't need to give Jay Leno any ammunition for when he invites me on his show.

Since that Summer I've learned a vast amount about video, sound, and shooting technique. For the record, my video shooting is much less eventful and much more professional than my independent film making. You can find my web site at http://imaginationvideo.com . If you're ever doing anything worth committing to video tape in Marquette, be sure to drop me a line.



-Dan