As we get closer to takeoff for The Palette Project’s first two colors, I find myself becoming more comfortable with my filmmaker’s hat. Thankfully, it helps that I still had my reporter’s hat stashed in the closet, and although took a few adjustments to get it cinched correctly, it still fits remarkably well after all these years.
Turns out being in daily news is, well, if not identical to working on a documentary, very much in the same language family. I can’t presume to say the deadline pressure is identical, but traveling to the other side of the world and having one chance to get the footage on specifics days… or else… well, it’s at least congruent. Certainly the beginning of production is a pretty ironclad deadline.
So in one sense, worlds are colliding – my past life as reporter, and my current one as a director, but the world of freedom a reporter live in is so vastly different than the world of filmmaking. Working reporters are probably doing a spit-take over the idea that there is world of freedom in that job, but to quote the great Joni Mitchell, you don’t know what you have ’til it’s gone. The ability to just show up and shoot what you need in the bvast majority of places you want to go is reason enough to stay in the business. For the naysayers, I would refer you to the seven filming permits that our little dog and pony show is required to carry in order to shoot in locations where a reporter could simply just show up and start shooting without any warning whatsoever.
This, by the way, concludes today’s entry in the “grass is always greener…” files.
What thrills me most about finally taking off is the idea of finally putting my virtual money where my virtual mouth is. My skin in the game, as it were, is living up to pretty big talk on my end that people with a physical challenge are just as capable of fulfilling the expectations accorded anyone else who just want their shot. Visually impaired photographer directing a documentary… and even shooting part of it? Tall order. Doable? In theory, sure. You can strap a GoPro camera onto a dog and get interesting footage. Does it have a consistent and unique creative vision? Directing that vision hopefully where everything up to this point in my life leads to this.
What’s about to happen is new territory, because unlike all those years in news, the risk is real. I don’t have a backup plan for failed footage or missing a deadline. There is no backup package from the feed that can run in my place if we don’t deliver. There is no other reporter or backup filler vo to pad the show. It’s California or bust, or in this case Australia or bust.
That fear of failure is both real and very, very exciting.
