So, do you remember that about a month ago I wrote about getting a feel for what acting is like? I didn’t really explain it back then, but that post was because I had just spent a day with friends over in the old city filming a video short. The group of us had wanted to do something like that for a long while, and at some point we finally decided to get off our butts to make this thing a reality. Prior to that Sunday we’d already met a few times to bounce ideas off each other. We settled on a script and filmed it all in one day. Now, we decided to get off our butts do film because we wanted to submit the short to a little monthly film fest that takes shows off homemade videos. God, that day of filming was brilliant. We all played with each other really well.

So, anyway, after filming we left the editing to those of us with editing experience. For the rest of us, we sat by content to hear the news of progress. All along, the news was good. Test audiences (read: friends of friends) were finding the material genuinely funny. Weeks later, a short 5 minute cut of the material was submitted. I had a look and I thought we did a great job. Yes, it felt a little crude, but in all honesty the crudeness didn’t outweigh the good qualities of the whole thing. For example, I could see multiple spots during the video where I was looking into the camera, or when my line delivery was pretty ugly. Still, I know how much effort we all put into it, so I was able to forgive myself.

After submitting, we waited a little bit anxiously to see if the video would get accepted and shown. We got news on the Saturday before the show. Amazing! So, we all made plans to meet up and attend the screening. On the night of the show, my friend brought along a number of people from the old town so we had a little bit of support, perhaps to bolster our vote numbers. Even with them though, the crowd in the theatre was rather large. An estimate was about 50 people or so. For me, watching ourselves on the screen was a bit nerve-wracking. I wasn’t sure how the audience would take things. To my relief they were laughing along. Overall the reception was positive.

As the night wore on, we saw more and more entries. They were all rather good. From them, I was able to learn and pick out spots where we could have made our video tighter, or where we could have improved. I really didn’t know how we would do because there were some strong entries. During a break I walked around and a couple of the my friend’s friends from the old town stopped me. They were praising me and seemed genuinely excited to meet me. All I could do was smile and thank them. Holy crap. I guess they would be…fans? Jesus.

After all the entries were shown, there was a small interval that had an interview with producer Colin Brunton (Little Mosque on the Prairie, The Cube). The whole night, the dude was sitting right in front of me and I had no idea. Didn’t care talk to the guy, but seriously I was just one foot away from a filmmaker. Crazy! Anyway, post interview they announced the winner, and just like I said in last night’s post: we won! Holy crap. You know, even with the support of the crowd from the old town the rest of the audience must have enjoyed our video as well. So damn happy.

So, here we are after the fact. Our plans are to come up with a new script and a new video sooner rather than later. We can’t rest on our laurels. We’ve got a good thing going with a solid group. Time to churn out more material.