Categories
Uncategorized

It’s a-me, Mario!

My son and I made the following video. Here’s how it all came together. I was re-organizing our garage a few weeks ago and came across my old box of childhood memorabilia. I pulled two binders full of my baseball cards and my 1992 Marvel Universe Series 3 card set.  Firstly, as a kid, I thought my Steve Avery and Mo Vaughn rookie cards would […]

Read More
Categories
Uncategorized

Now What? 

Preface: Last month, in August, we were invited to screen our previous short film, Life With Wifey, at a pop up event in Los Angeles called The Great Film Club. This new community of filmmakers showcases short films every month, so it was a great opportunity to watch our finished film for the first time on a big screen in front of our peers. I’m […]

Read More
Categories
Uncategorized

Fly me to the moon (with Ai)

Filmmakers now have access to a charcuterie board of new AI tools. You can fire up ChatGPT and there’s a writing partner immediately by your side. You can use machine learning as an Assistant Editor, and boom, you’ve automated otherwise tedious editing tasks. I mean, for a poor creative like myself, having a robot-friend can really help enhance my low budget productions. So, in our […]

Read More
Categories
Uncategorized

The most fun, but equally ridiculous TV ad I’ve ever directed

More than a decade ago, I had my own production company. We were a vendor for Google TV Adwords (now defunct) and got a lot of requests from a variety of businesses around the country: tech, pebble tiles, wine, jewelers, software—you name it. We were pumping out a diverse mix of short, 0:30 spots for broadcast television and having a great time.  One morning, I […]

Read More
Categories
Uncategorized

Behind the Beard: Short Films I’ve Made While Shaving

Yes, I was born with a weird face. But good news for you, I’m blessed with the ability to cover it up with a beard. I keep hair on my face for the following reasons: Nevertheless, there comes a time in my yearly beard journey when it just gets to be too much. It starts getting itchy, or in the way, or caught in my […]

Read More

My pandemic filming journey and a jar of mayonnaise 

The global pandemic was a bummer. Everyone was at home, twiddling their twiddles. So in early 2021, in the middle of covid spikes, I was pacing around my living room. How could I hang out with my filmmaker friends and make a short film while avoiding the plague?  I knew the following parameters needed to be in place: The answer? A short film which takes […]

Read More
Categories
Uncategorized

Q1 2023: new work, reel, and updates

Hi Friends, here are a few work projects from Q1 2023 as well as some life updates!  Get Creative with Less 2023 started off weird. In fact, it’s still weird. The economy is wobbly and budgets are conservative. Layoffs are happening all around us and it seems like everyone is holding onto their butts. Nevertheless, pilots know how to fly in turbulence, and similarly, our […]

Read More
Categories
Uncategorized

How I used my iPhone and a vuvuzela to create a short film with my daughter

To commemorate every World Cup for the last decade, I’ve purchased a 4-pack of vuvuzela’s on Amazon and handed one to each of my children. And every time, my wife has thrown them into the trash without our permission. Unsure why. Also, rude.  This year, before my wife could find all of them, my daughter and I hid a blue one and made this film […]

Read More
Categories
Uncategorized

Storyboarding – bringing people into my vision

Bringing people into your creative vision is hard. How do you do that? Well, you can wave your arms around like I’m doing in the pic above. But that only works if you’re JLO’s dance choreographer. For me, as a Writer and Director at LinkedIn, this happens through many phases of pre-production like: briefing, scripting, location scouting, and more. But for this post, I’m going to […]

Read More
Categories
Uncategorized

Making Shorts on a Budget: How to Utilize Your Offspring

Making a short is hard and expensive, so if you’re in a position like me where your kids have already taken all your money, why not put them to work! With their endless energy and ability to never stop talking, they’ll make for some great unpaid talent. So if you’re trying to upskill with some filmmaking R&D, forget calling Tom Hanks, because your kids will […]

Read More