This has nothing to do with anything, I just like this picture

Once again, my apologies to my fellow Indoobians who have been waiting for my regular writings. I also promised to make more videos but things haven’t worked out the way I intended every time I get ready to record myself. One day I forget the tripod, the next day I forget the camera, the day after that I can’t control the lighting and then the day after that I’m just no longer in the mood.

As they say, life happens.

So a video will come when it is ready. The videos I had in mind would feature my review of 2011 (the longer I wait, the less relevant it seems to do it), Oscar nominations (which you can hear on The Lost Dial) and various other things like movie and food reviews.

I sometimes feel I’ve gotten too busy for my own good. I look back on the past week and wonder where the time went. I can’t blame it on TV, as much as I love to keep up with some of my favorite shows, I only spend about two hours watching it. Perhaps I’m sleeping too much. As I type that very sentence, I think of coffee and how I haven’t had any yet.

I have lists of lists of things to do. That isn’t a typo, I literally have my lists of to-do lists. Some are church related, some are 3S related. Oh, by the way, from now on, I’m calling 3S:FX Productions, “3S” for short because if you had to say 3S:FX Productions out loud 17 times in a single conversation, your mouth would be very tired and require 2 glasses of water. Anyway, you get the point. I have things to do and I feel like I don’t get them all done in the timely manner that I expect.

I can’t wait for the day when I can hire an assistant. Oh the joys of saying “Dorthy Jane, hold all my calls.” Yes, that’ll be the day, indeed.

But I’ll end on this thought: I am taking full responsibility for not getting my plans completed. I’m blaming my lack of ambition after getting over the mad holiday hustle and bustle. I need to remind myself that people are depending on me to succeed, even if they aren’t I need to believe that they are because that’s what drives me. My fear of failure is one of a million things that keeps me moving forward, even if that translates to sitting in this chair for 10 hours editing a 15 minute video.

What is pre-panic?

Picture this: you’re driving along on a road, all is going well, it’s a nice day, music is great, birds are singing, hunky dory, etc. But look, there’s a bridge coming up. No big deal, except unbeknownst to you, the bridge is in bad shape. By the time you notice the bridge will leave you in a bad situation, you slam on the breaks.

But you hit the breaks too late, and you are now in that bad situation.

Pre-panic is that split second moment between realizing the danger and reacting to it. Sure, you can just not panic, but we’re all human… it’s something that just sneaks up on us like a well timed joke. While laughter helps you lose calories, panicking doesn’t do much of anything except maybe freak out or annoy others around you.

In my moment of pre-panic, while I’m driving in my car, I’m remembering that old saying about Jesus being my passenger (or the driver? I can’t remember which) but either way, I look over to realize everything is going to be alright. For all I know, the broken down bridge is probably part of the journey. Perhaps I need to pull over for a little while and wait for the bridge to be repaired. Maybe it’s safer to walk across the bridge. Or just maybe there’s another route around it altogether.

The point of the pre-panic is not to panic at all. Ultimately, when using that moment in time wisely, any “freaking out” will be to a minimum if none at all. Another word for it: rationalizing. But when was the last time you remember rationalizing and panicking at the same time?

While I don’t yet know at this point how I’m going to overcome this adversity, I do know that everything is going to be alright. God has brought me this far, I know he’s not going to leave me stranded for too long.

I digress. I’ve been throwing myself into numerous projects and sometimes my sleeping habits suffer because of it. My entire neck is screaming due to a cramp that woke me from my slumber late last night. I spent a few hours trying to find the most comfortable spot so the bones/muscles/joints/neck-pieces would realign itself and I would wake up feeling rejuvenated. Sadly, no such luck. I need a new neck. In fact, I woke up later than I intended but that’s only because the sleep I desperately sought after for the past week was finally discovered and it was too delicious to leave it.

Nevertheless, I arose since I knew I had many a thing to get accomplished today. Surprisingly, blogging wasn’t one of them. But part of my plan was using the recording and editing studios which are currently booked up, which is why I’m blogging now.

The other things I’ve been up to recently include redesigning my church’s website, designing 3S:FX Productions’ website, recording two voice overs for two clients (with deadlines within two days of one another and a week to complete them). Yesterday was a mostly typical Tuesday that found me recording The Lost Dial with Wendy and only Wendy. “Not a problem” I thought to myself. We are 30+ episodes in and I personally feel I’m not being “myself”. But I’ve started of thinking of ways to fix that so maybe listeners will notice a change in future episodes. However, this last episode I feel is my personal worst. (Self-critique complete.) After the show, I had my last computer class of the year.

By the time I got home, I was too exhausted to do anything in the way of productivity. So I went to bed after eating some rather disappointing Chinese food. I think it’s time to find a new take out spot.

The day is still young. I have many assignments that need to be completed before the sun goes down. And perhaps a dozen more after it actually does. If you notice my Twitter feed is quieter than usual, you’ll know I’m either hard at work, driving somewhere, but unfortunately probably not sleeping.

UPDATE

While I intended to post this soon after I wrote it, that didn’t happen. But the rest of my day more or less went according to schedule. I completed one of the two assignments as I patiently wait for a response. Meanwhile, I’ve decided from here on out that when it comes to posting Lost Dial podcasts, I shall keep them to an hour per upload.

Or I just wish I had multiple computers so while one was burning a DVD, I could do some work on another one. By work, I mean waste time on Twitter. I’d rather let whatever system I’m using work on one thing at a time then risk some major flaw in a 30 minute production that takes 2 hours to produce because I feel like being the best multitasker in existence.

So I’m currently waiting for a video I produced months ago to go through the initial “movie-making” process. I use Windows Movie Maker to make most of the videos you see on my YouTube and Vimeo pages. It’s no Final Cut Pro, but it gets the job done. Until I get a Mac at home, anyway. Please donate to the “Buy t. sterling a Mac Fund”.

Part of 3S:FX is making DVDs of the sermons at my church. I found that one video in particular freezes midway through, which would make for a horrible production, unless I was Andy Warhol. Like the genius I’m known to be, I never save the project files of the videos I produce, which forces me to arrange all the original files from scratch. This sometimes proves to benefit me, but overall, it’s a slight annoyance when I need to correct an error that would only require to clicks but now take 2 hours. I’m stubborn. Aren’t most geniuses?

Speaking of geniuses, isn’t Prince amazing? I like to listen to him while I work. Occasionally when it rains. Or I’m feeling a little crazy.

Truth be told, I’ve been processing video since about 6 pm on Sunday. I ripped a stack of 8 DVDs, converted them, converted raw video from a sermon earlier that day, edited that together, burned a DVD, and uploaded a handful of videos to the internet. Oh wait, some of that was done on Saturday. And I had been editing since Thursday. Hmm.

It hit me late last night that being my own business means I can work my own hours. I decided to clock out around 3 am, clocked back in around 10 am. By no means am I complaining about this. I forgot probably the best part. I’m selling the DVDs I’m producing, and getting paid for the DVDs I’m ripping/converting/uploading.

And the only reason it’s taking me so long to do all of these things is because I’m just getting it all organized. My office stays cleaner than my bedroom, yet I spend much more time in my office. Or at CSB. After this week, I’ll have more time on my hands to do more writing, creating, collaborating. I’ll schedule the processing to take place on my least busiest days, or overnight, while I clean my room.

Check out one of my productions (experiments) I produced last week:

…I’m actually in a better state of mind. I just need to breathe and pray.

What’s got me feeling overwhelmed today? Well, starting a business just about scares me in a fun and exciting way. There are a bunch of things I want to do for people, some that I’ve met, and some that I’m about to meet. What I want to do has to agree with the time that I have to do it. From the Lost Dial, to producing a few commercials, to making CDs and DVDs of church sermons. So my problem really becomes: how organized am I?

One look at my bedroom and you’d start to doubt I have organizational skills. But I do have a plaque on my wall that reads “Creative minds are seldom tidy.” I believe this to be true, so I’m not worried about the mess and clutter. I clean my room, office, computer and hard drives at least once a month to “gather my bearings” before throwing them all over the place again. Just yesterday I cleaned off my office desk. I expect it to remain clutter-free for at least 3 days.

But once I figure out what I’m doing, when I’m doing it, and how I’m doing it, I’ll be able to see clearly the where the realm of busy ends and overwhelmed begins. And if I see myself careening over the edge into that territory, I’ll be sure to start applying the breaks as well as screaming for help before that happens. Mr. Cool never panics.

My little break is over, time to get back to work. And the work that I do, I like to work as hard as I play. Stay cool kids!

But like I said, I’m taking the blame because it was my fault for being late. I will admit that it felt a bit harsh, but having met him the day before, I can understand his tone. Plus it’s only my second day and this is my first job that I get my call time the night before I’m to go in. I also felt pretty useless for a few hours yesterday thanks to my inexperience around some of their equipment. But that’s to be expected, right? Oh yeah, I was working as an A/V tech. Not your local high school geeks, this was advanced, expensive and pay-for-its-sophistication technology. In other words, once I learned the ropes, I would’ve fit right in. Or so I would hope. And it looks like one of these ropes I missed completely. What is the meaning of that metaphor anyway? Climbing a rope in gym class? Boxing ring? Rickety bridge with planks of broken wood?

As it stands, this story isn’t over yet. Due to this just happening, I can still call the “main guy” to see if I’m completely done or if I have a chance to redeem myself. I’m not one that likes to be late and I do the best I can to make it a habit to show up early to everything… which is why I understand why a late call from me would translate into “just don’t bother.” In this business, if you’re on time, you’re late. That’s a law that’s repeated in any job that involves performance, unless you are the main attraction.

But with this being the first paying job I’ve had since February, I want to follow up ASAP. I already spoke to my support team and they told me to do likewise, and that this job is also a pit stop to what I have planned to do and I’ve already alluded to in earlier posts. 3S:FX Productions is still coming soon…

And for the record, writing about this experience is helping me cope. I have nothing negative to say about the company or people I was working with. In case you missed it, I’m saying this was my fault. Lesson re-learned.

UPDATE

Turns out that all is not lost. A simple phone call more or less helped to clear up the matter and everyone is on good terms. Perhaps a misunderstanding? Whatever the case, as long as I can help it, I won’t let them down again.

But right now I’m talking about new comer and later fall debut of Once Upon A Time, a sorta retelling or a modern-ish look at classic fairy tales. Actually I live-tweeted the show and decided mid-way that I’d write a review about it. The other boasting property this show has is that it features a couple of the writers from LOST lore. That’s an important fact for later.

Unfortunately for you readers trying to get a good idea of the show, I’m feeling incredibly lazy.

From Wikipedia:

On the wedding day of Snow White (Ginnifer Goodwin), and Prince Charming(Joshua Dallas), the Evil Queen (Lana Parrilla) arrives and delivers an ominous threat about a powerful curse she intends to release upon them. Some time later, a pregnant Snow White is worried about the curse and visits Rumplestiltskin(Robert Carlyle) who issues a prophecy that the Queen’s curse will take them all someplace terrible where there will be no happy endings, except for her. He also reveals that Snow White’s unborn daughter, Emma, will return when she is 28 years old to rescue them, thus beginning the final battle with the Queen. On advice from the Blue Fairy, Geppetto (Tony Amendola) and Pinocchio fashion a cupboard from a magical tree which will allow one person to escape the Queen’s curse. On the day Snow White gives birth to her daughter, the Queen’s curse strikes. Prince Charming places their daughter in the magic cupboard, but is mortally wounded battling the Queen’s henchmen. The Queen stands triumphantly over Snow White and Prince Charming as the curse takes them to “someplace horrible”.

In present day Boston, Emma Swan (Jennifer Morrison) lives a lonely existence working as a bail bondsman and bounty hunter. She is approached by a ten year old boy, Henry, who identifies himself as her son, whom she had given up for adoption as a teenager. Not wanting a relationship with him, Emma agrees to drive him back to his home in not-so-quaint Storybrooke, Maine. Along the way, Henry shows her a large book of fairy tales he has, insisting that all of the stories in it are real. When they arrive in Storybrooke, Henry informs her that everyone in town is in reality a fairy tale character, exiled by the curse and with no memory of their real identities. This includes his therapist, who is really Jiminy Cricket, and his teacher Mary Margaret Blanchard, who is really Snow White. He claims that time is frozen in Storybrooke and the people are unable to leave, but that the curse will be broken by Emma. A skeptical Emma returns Henry to his adopted mother, the town Mayor, who is really the Evil Queen. When Henry soon runs away again, Emma finds him and decides to stay in Storybrooke temporarily. This decision causes the hands of the town clock, previously frozen, to begin moving again.

Overall, I liked it. The story began and it just moved. Nothing felt forced or dragged on which is a good sign that these writers know where they’re going and what they want to do. Needless to say, character development isn’t too hard since most of these are well known characters already, they are just reimagined… sorta. Think of Shrek, but without Shrek and the comedic sing-a-longs.

I was intrigued enough to want to see what happens next, or how her stay will change the residents in this magical town. I haven’t done it yet, but I will set my DVR to season pass mode. It seems to be some good entertainment for the kiddies too. Well, maybe not wee kiddies, but Sunday at 8pm at one time was the time to sit around the TV as a family. I dunno, I’m just saying when I was a kid that’s what we did.

As for the LOSTies, savvy tweeters and I caught a few LOST references such as Emma’s eye opening shot, Emma’s room number (#108), and a clock tower stuck on 8:15 (and just for extreme fans, it did change to 8:16). Another Lostonian-esque note to mention is what I started calling flash-fairy tale (like flashback, flash forward, flash sideways). It won’t catch on, but you get the idea.

I approve of this show. Will it last? I think it has potential, but I have no idea how it did in the ratings yet. I didn’t see it trending, so who can say? I’ll be watching for as long as it’s on. I recommend tagging along for this adventure though. Fun for the whole family!

I’ve noticed the dip start to happen around the time I stopped regularly promoting the show on my Facebook wall. In fact, it was part of my experiment. My Twitter followers know I talk about the show quite frequently. Ironically, the days I’m most quiet (on Twitter) are the days I’m in the studio. It’s hard to keep up with tweeting about what we’re talking about or what we did talk about when you’re in the flow. Plus, after the show, we tend to have a “debriefing” and discuss how the show went, plans for next week, plans for the rest of the day, and what inappropriate thing Barb recently said. (Listen to the show to find out more about that.)

Creatively, I feel the show is in a good place, or is getting in a better place, as we find our groove (even if that means a few of the original members decide to do other things, I’d like to say that I wish them well and not to lose touch). Should The Indoob ever start a podcast, future, past and present LD Crew members are welcome to join it. I actually have a few people in mind I’d like to have on my show should I ever do one. But at the moment, most of my energy is placed into the Dial and seeing how far we can take it.

This was Mike's idea...

I’ve got a bunch of ideas and would love to follow through with them, but I just need to know our listeners, or our Dialers, are out there supporting us. I want to interact as much as possible. Sooner or later, I’m hoping the ANR lounge will get internet service again and maybe we can set up a Skype account so we can talk to people on the air. I may also open up a YouTube channel since Mike and I have plans to make commercials and other video related things.

With all that said, these are my reasons why I’m hoping my negligence of Facebook isn’t negatively effecting The Lost Dial. Sure we’ve mostly declared ourselves to be #TeamTwitter, I’m hoping the show will find newer fans outside of Facebook even though that site is the best way to keep our fans informed as to what we’re doing. The Lost Dial’s Facebook page will still remain active, and if anything, that’ll be the few times I’m personally using it. As of right now, I have don’t know when I plan on regularly using Facebook, especially since I recently found a few people who have very similar opinions about what social networks are doing to our culture. At least with a podcast, it’s actually people talking to each other verbally with words… and soon with video! But give us some time with that.

In the meantime, continue to interact with us including Facebook. Besides Twitter, we are now on Formspring, so please ask us questions and we’ll answer them on the show… maybe in video form! Tell your friends!

This documentary looks at the craft of advertising in today’s world. It looks at both print ads, and those 30 seconds people like me fast forward when we’re watching TV shows on DVR. Just like Mad Men, the film took a peek at ad work from the 60′s as it moved down the timeline to the popular jingles and slogans of yesteryear, from “Where’s the beef?” to “Just do it” to “got milk?” More than likely, you’ve seen or heard of these before. If not, you’ve probably been living inside of a large rock, buried under a much larger rock.

The subjects of the film were various agencies discussing their humble beginnings or how they came up with the genius campaigns that helped their accounts make billions and keep them a household name/product for years to come. The interesting fact with some of these ads is simply dumb luck. Anytime you do something creative to catch people’s interest (and ultimately their pockets), there’s always risk of failing.

I’m going to take a moment now that this was the final push that made me decide to take my idea of a production company seriously. I’ve made a few commercials for class earlier this year, followed by a real one for a real business I’m still working on. While ad agencies aren’t the same as production companies, they do work very closely together. So from watching what these guys in the film do and applying the skills I’ve learned the past year, why not take a risk and gamble on myself?

These guys make it look easy

What had me freaking out at the thought of making commercials is: how will I ever come up with ideas for the next guy who asks me for an ad? Do I have it in me to constantly crank out ideas? Fortunately, the film answered this question within the first few minutes. One guy said that they wake up everyday feeling that same kind of anxiety. So in other words, even for the professionals, not knowing what’ll happen next is completely normal. As irony would have it, their anxiety calmed me down.

Then I thought back to Mad Men and how those characters go through the same thing, trying to figure out a creative way to sell their client’s products. If their idea sucked and was shot down, they went back to the drawing board until brilliance struck again.

So the documentary didn’t show what the failures might have looked like, or ideas that didn’t quite pan out. Basically the ugly side of advertising wasn’t really shown. I don’t know what that looks like. But something that has stuck with me is “Fail Harder,” which something of a motto and/or billboard to remind everyone involved that mistakes are encouraged, or at least that’s how I interpret it.  There are dozens of quotes out there about making mistakes and learning from failure, but that one in particular summed it up best. Although one of the ad men spoke of failure differently in a way that begs me to go back and watch it again to take everyone’s words to heart as if they are giving me golden advice nuggets.

This was made with thousands of push pins.

As a film, I’m sure it’ll be enlightening to those interested in the behind the scenes of some of the most popular commercials over the decades. As a device for those looking to get into the business, I think it might be a priority. Just as a bit of a warning, there is some adult language, so watch out for that should you be offended by frankness.

My final thoughts about this goes back to the “Fail Harder” concept and the “Just do it” slogan. I’ve never been a fan of the word “try” because it implies that you’re already setting yourself up for failure, or almost implying that you won’t succeed. With that kind of mentality, one might not give their all to accomplish that goal they are “trying” to do. Instead, you just do it. Win or lose, you went for it with all you had.