The Home Stretch


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December is over. Can you believe it? First semester has come and gone and we are all still here. Hooray! I thought this would be the perfect time to talk about ROBOX.

In case you forgot, “Robox” is the big Production I film I am working on. It stars a cute kid and a giant cardboard robot. Just check the old blog post and it’ll come back to you. I also wanted to come clean. It’s no accident you haven’t heard about it. The last couple of weeks were kind of tough. I was nervous about my project and didn’t want to admit it. Now I’ve come clean.

Here’s a secret most filmmakers won’t tell you. When you look at the rough footage you have no idea what sort of film you have. What’s rough footage? It’s the film that you get after you shoot. You don’t edit it or put it in any special order. It’s pretty rough. Hence the term rough footage. Well, I looked at mine and went into panic mode. Not because it was bad or anything, but because it was still unformed. That’s what happens when I wear my artist hat. I become overly critical, don’t want to admit things aren’t going my way, and am reluctant to ask for help. I know these are bad habits, but I’m working on them.

Despite the jitters I didn’t work on this project alone. When you’ve got people working with you, it makes everything much easier. You know that you can depend on people because they share a similar goal. There’s no way I would be able to finish this project if it wasn’t for the people who have helped me along the way.

Speaking of teamwork I’m fortunate enough I get to work with one of my fellow student ambassadors, Mason Kaye. He’s scoring Robox. That means he’s composing all the music. It’s great. Not just because he is incredibly talented and knowledgeable, but we’ve had similar ideas on how the music should fit the project, and I’ve liked all his ideas.

Anyway, I’ve got one more week and the project is almost over. The heartwarming tale of a giant cardboard robot took a life of its own. I got through it. I survived. I got something better than I could have hoped (under the circumstances) because of the team that helped me. It just goes to show that if you fight through the doubt you’ll surprise yourself.