Three Songs

Not only is Tom Petty one of the great heroes of rock n' roll, but he's still out there doing it - and there's an energy and soul to his live songs that is so rare, especially for someone who's been doing it for so long. This song is amazing, and the way the crowd join in at the end is heavenly!

Music from New Orleans breaks my heart. Here is Davell Crawford, singing 'Louisiana 1927.' My heart is broken before he even begins singing!

This is a live version of a Counting Crows Song, 'Rain King' - filmed by an audience member at a concert a couple of weeks back. If the bad camera work bugs you - then just skip to 2:10.. when a 12 year old boy, Michael Weber, is handed an electric guitar and then goes on to steal the show. Incredible! This is what music is about! This is what life is about!! I could watch this again and again. This is a Kid In The Front Row if ever there was one. Wow wow wow.

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The Beautiful Possibilities Of The Next Rental

Is there anything more exciting than 'Awaiting Allocation' ?

The next film could change my life.

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A Way To Shoot Anywhere With No Permission - For Free!

This always works! Whether you turn up with just a camera, or with an eight person crew. Here's what you do.

1) Shoot scenes ANYWHERE YOU WANT.

2) Cheerily begin conversation with the man who comes up to you demanding you stop filming.

3) Give him this PRECISE explanation. "This is actually a test shoot. We're thinking of filming here, and paying of course, so we just want to test how it looks."

Madly enough, this explanation works! The person thinks "oh, that makes sense; you need to check if the location is appropriate," and they let you carry on. I discovered this many years ago, and it has worked for me every time. If they say "So why do you have a make-up artist and sound guy?" you just tell them "Well we need to know if the sound here is viable, and we the make-up artist needs to get an idea of the lighting."

People always buy this! So when someone asks you what you're filming; tell them you're not, you're just location scouting with your crew. Perfect.

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A Small Example Of Typecasting.

From an email conversation today.

Actor: "Looking forward to getting randomly killed. Again."

Me: "Hahahaha! I always make rom-coms but when I kill people I always call on you!"

I'm off to shoot some stuff. I'll be back after the weekend, when I will share the story of how everything went smoothly with absolutely no problems at all. That's the plan.

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Freelancing - How Much Should You Charge?

"How much are you looking for?" says the scary person on the other end of the phone. You get into an absolute panic. Should I work for free? Maybe just charge a little, like 50? But wait, Bryan got paid 400 a day for his job. I think I'm worth at least 300. But maybe their whole budget is 300? I'm confused???

"Hello? Are you there? How much are you looking for?" repeats the scary woman.

"Well uh, y'know," you say, hoping she'll respond with "oooh, you want 600 a day? Sure!"

How much should you charge? How much are you worth? How much do they have? What is the most you could get? How much would others get? How much is too much? How much is so little that they assume you're an amateur?

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