Hollywood, Unapologetic!

- Season 5

(2018)

Many of you have dreams of becoming a motion picture director. You have a favorite director. You've watched every single thing he or she has ever made. You know the history and backstory of each project, and of all the principals involved. The body of work inspires you to become a director. But . . . you don't know where to begin. You're in luck. I'm going to give you a checklist to help you get started. This is the first part of what you need to know to help you get the ball rolling. I'm hoping that this will motivate you while you are putting everything together. ...

The first stage in the filmmaking process for film, television and for video production is the development stage. This is when ideas for a film are put together. Sometimes that means acquiring the rights to a book, stage play, magazine article, video game, comic book, graphic novel, or directly from the source of a true story. Other times the screenplay has already been written or a pitch for an idea is available.

The second stage in the filmmaking process is the pre production stage. This is when you prepare all of the moving parts to your project. Pre production should not begin until you have financing secured, as well as the cinematographer, key production crew members and cast are secured.

The third stage in the filmmaking process is the production stage. This is the physical production where the scenes are created and captured for the film. The film's executive in charge of production or production supervisor would hire the additional crew needed for principal photography.

The fourth stage in the filmmaking process is the post-production stage. This is where all of the media that was captured is assembled and edited together. Probably the best way to look at this stage of the filmmaking process is to think of your film as being a huge puzzle with thousands of integral parts that make up the completed story.

The fifth and final stage in the filmmaking process is the distribution stage. It doesn't matter the amount of time and effort that has gone into creating your film if no one ever sees it. Having it as a vanity piece will not further your craft, career, nor the careers of anyone else who bled and sweat along side you on this adventure.

Know what this is about? Be the first one to add a plot.

May 29th 2018, Roseanne Barr posted a tweet, "muslim brotherhood and planet of the apes had a baby=vj." This was in reference to former President Obama administration advisor Valerie Jarrett. This was all part of a series of Twitter posts that started late Monday night. While Barr defended herself against charges of Islamophobia, writing, "ISLAM is not a RACE, lefties. Islam includes EVERY RACE of people," along with retweets of supportive commentary from similarly pro-Trump supporters. This led to Roseanne consulting producer Wanda Sykes announced she would not ...

Over my working in and around the entertainment industry for decades, I'd hear over and over again, "You know, I work really hard and get to see a break, but I seem to really mess things up, every time. I push and push and when I see a glimmer of light in front of me and BOOM. I screwed up, yet once again. I miss a meeting, or I show up only to say the wrong thing. I lose track of important closing details or I just don't follow through. I don't understand why I keep doing this?" Does this sound familiar? Does this sound like something you've said or have thought ...

After the recent passing of Anthony Bourdain a few weeks ago, I noticed a sudden increase on social media of friends and friends of friends fighting with suicidal thoughts. And as many of you know, just being in the entertainment world, there sure is a lot of negativity and toxicity around as a byproduct of the way the system is set up. That was a large part of what motivated me to write my books and start this web series, all in the hopes to help others circumvent some of the toxic nature of our industry and hopefully have fuller and more balanced lives. But these ...

Today's episode is directly for those aspiring millennial filmmakers and content creators that may feel stuck in a rut, or don't know how to get moving forward in their careers. I've been there. We all have. And that's OK. "What do you want to do?" This is a question you need to ask yourself early on. Even if you have more than one thing you would like to do when you grow up, narrowing them down so you can create a realistic approach to get there is a necessity for you to have a focus. "What do you want to do?" is the question you are going to be asked almost every ...

How does a video game teach me anything about filmmaking? Well, it's a bit more involved than just playing any video game. Epic Games, the creators of Fortnite asked game players to create their own fan films. The submissions had to be at least one minute in length, and no longer than five minutes. The rest of their criteria were pretty straightforward: Judging would be based on your creativity, your mastery of the Replay tools, and the level of "Fortnite-ness" -- the quality of capturing the tone of Fortnite itself.

When I decided to revisit the subject of diversity in the entertainment industry, in particular the film and television side, I went on YouTube to take a look at what came up in the search tool. To my surprise, two videos popped out; "Diversity" Is a Weapon Against White People, with 263,000 views, and 7 Shows That Have Too Many People Of Color, with 855,000 views. Based on the titles alone, it was clear that the producer's intentions were about having less of a constructive conversation about hiring practices, which has been the baseline for much of this ongoing ...