Professional Juggler and Knot Tyer

It's the first Monday of summer break for St. Anne the Wife and our boys. Try as I might, that woman will always be the better of us. Along with the rest of the year, she runs the summer circus at our house and we both know the lions and tigers are getting stronger and smarter. Surely they'll figure out they need us at some point, but I'm not holding my breath.

Somehow I've gone from gathering dust and questioning my life choices to being incredibly busy and still questioning my life choices. This past week had me busting my tail as a grip & electric on a commercial shoot here in Oklahoma City followed by a wild and memorable day of doc work behind a "camera."

If nothing else, freelancing teaches you how to do the thing while simultaneously prepping for the next thing. In between my hauling sandbags, rags, and combo stands to the next setup this week in the G&E department, I was juggling emails, texts, and Basecamp pings for the other jobs I'm in, all in various states of progress. There's the audio bid I'm submitting to a new-ish client, followed by the tech questions I'm working through with the Tennessee rental house for the shoot in Vegas, and the edits that are sorta working on that other thing. "Dang, looks like I'll need the nine inch 15mm rails instead of the six" and "Will you be needing sound effects with that audio guide too?" and "Here's my Venmo info for the first half of tomorrow's day-rate and expenses." Oh, and I also learned how to tie a clove hitch knot and that a combo stand weighs and feels just about the same as a built out Alexa Amira on my right shoulder.

This week also had me finishing out a book I'd bought about New York City while in New York City last weekend. The Colossus of New York by Colson Whitehead was a fun read with a crazy interesting writing style.

“You are a New Yorker when what was there before is more real and solid than what is here now.” ― Colson Whitehead, The Colossus of New York

I'm already onto the next book I'd picked up at Books are Magic in Brooklyn last weekend. The Hard Crowd by Rachel Kushner has already taken me through her experience racing down the Baja Peninsula on a Kawasaki Ninja. Stoked to get through the rest of her book.

"Happy Xmas" - VEVO & Contrast Films

"Hey dude! Wanted to see if you’re available to cam op on a multi-cam thing this Wednesday in NYC. Should be a fun one!" - Jordy Wax, Contrast Films

Anne the Wife and I have been super quiet about our decision to move to New York City. That being said, I've been hustling behind the scenes the last year or so in reaching out to other creatives. Turns out freelancing without connections is called "unemployed."

One of those cold emails, direct messages via Instagram, and/or bat signals was to Micah Bickham at VEVO. That led to a phone call while I was in Las Vegas for NAB which led to an introduction and quick face-to-face with Jordy Wax at Contrast Films – he was in Vegas for NAB too. All that nonsense plus plenty more along the way gets us to the other day.

Jordy shot me an email late Saturday night about cam op'ing on a "multi-cam shoot in NYC" on Wednesday morning; not much detail outside that. If you've been following along for any period the obvious answer was a polite and collected "Yea man! I'm in" while FREAKING OUT ON THE INSIDE AND HOPING THEY DON'T FIND OUT YOU'RE A FAKE. A few emails, a call sheet, and a Google search later it turns out to be a shoot at Electric Lady Studios with with Miley Cyrus, Mark Ronson, and a special guest.

"Good job team. Looks like our work here is done and we can pack it up. No need to try and do anything else to professionally top what I got to do a month into moving to New York." - Me

There's no need to try and explain how big a deal Electric Lady Studios is – just know we've all heard music recorded there. There's no way I was going to be late so I figured being thirty minutes early was a solid balance between "professional" and "Oh God, who is this guy?" The space was buzzing with an army of people who all seemed to know what they were doing. Then there was me, the nervous mid-semester transfer student trying hard to "play it cool" while simultaneously fighting back the urge to projectile vomit out of excitement.

There were five or six Alexa Minis with Vantage Hawk anamorphic lenses on various tripods, sliders, and one prepped for a Movi Pro. I straight up stood next to the camera with the biggest lens because it was the most out of the way when Micah Bickham – who was directing all this nonsense – walked up and assigned me to it. "So you're going to be on Camera 1. 85% of your shots will be following Miley with some slow zooms. You've shot live music performance stuff, right?"

I’ve had shoots and editing work with existing clients since I’ve been in New York, but shooting on this project was technically my first paid gig after moving to the city. Honestly, I couldn’t have asked for a better situation and I’m incredibly thankful. It's not like I've never worked on big sets with high-profile celebrities and high-end gear. More than anything this just felt like a door opening after patiently knocking for more than a decade.

There's no shame in admitting how floored I was to be in the same room and work with creatives I've followed online for years. There were also plenty of others I got to meet and now follow. There's also no shame in admitting I had no idea who the long-haired guitar player was they were all tripping out about – my bad.

Fun bonus fact about the scheduling of this shoot: I'd already been booked for a project in Phoenix the next day and thankfully I'd booked a flight out of NYC later Wednesday afternoon. Scheduling somehow threaded the needle on this one with the morning VEVO shoot in Greenwich Village giving me enough time to get back to Brooklyn, get Clara the dog to the pet boarding place, and me to the airport with my gear in time to catch the direct flight to Phoenix. Thanks science.

Phoenix and Red-Eye Flights

This week had me booked again with Running Robot to shoot out on their home turf in Phoenix, AZ. Being used to flying out of Oklahoma City all these years, it was a bit of a hike from New York to that part of the country. Flying out Wednesday afternoon got me there in time to get to sleep that night, pick up rental gear the next morning, the actual shoot, return rental gear, and then race back to the airport for a red-eye flight back to NYC Thursday night.

Big fan of LensRentals and how easy they make shipping across the country. For this trip, it was easier to rent and ship a similar tripod to a local FedEx vs. me traveling with mine. For grip and electric, I connected with MP&E Equipment Rental out in Scottsdale. They're 30-40 minutes outside of Phoenix but the scenery was worth the drive.

Speaking of Scottsdale, Chris Fenner – a solid Instagram follow and car enthusiast – introduced me to Four Coffee and their rubber stamps. Have I mentioned I've got a mild obsession with collecting rubber stamps from coffee shops? It's a thing and filling up my notebooks...

Once again, we were rocking the two-camera interview setup: Canon 5D Mark III with a 70-200 lens for the tight; Canon 7D with a 24-70 for the wide. They also had me shoot a third camera through the interview to act as additional B-roll for the edit. The Running Robot guys booked a conference room in a downtown Phoenix co-working space. Three of the four walls were floor-to-ceiling glass so reflections were a real issue.

Slowly but surely I too am preaching the good news of working with these 4' Quasar Crossfades. The slim profile let me get the backlight in a tight spot between the talent and the glass wall. The skimpy dimmers from the rental house were unusable trash, so instead I used some gaffe tape on the fixture to make a small skirt on the light cutting back some of the output. Oh, and the baby pin mounting option and rubber bumpers on each end of the tubes – so rad. The hodgepodge of color temps flooding the glass room from everywhere was a hot mess. I still feel like the color on these fixtures is a bit more red than I'm used to, but it's an easy fix in camera or post. My iPhone Xs was having issues too in getting the color temps correct for these BTS photos. Side note: we had to rig the audio boom pole to a light stand via spring clamps because we felt like it (and didn't have the proper mount anyway).

Can we talk for a moment about red-eye flights? They're pretty awful – but still have their place. By all means it was my choice in scheduling because I wanted "the experience." Plus I knew it would help budget-wise seeing as how expensive all this is. Plus (plus) I'd already scheduled a couple meetings back in NYC knowing I'd be back in time thanks to flying through the night. The air travel part isn't that bad. Yes, it sucks trying to sleep on a plane, especially on a rough flight and next to a seatmate who isn't into "personal space", "boundaries", or "jackets without massive shoulder pads." Some solid red-eye flight tips are only a Google search away and I know what I'll be doing next time – i.e. neck pillow, window seat, glasses instead of contact lenses, etc...

For me, the rough part of flights back to NYC is actually getting from the airport back to my place in Brooklyn. There's a tipping point between the financial benefits of public transit ($15-20 and 60-90 minutes) and the time and comfort of just hiring a car from the airport ($50+ and 30-40 minutes). It was seriously a trip stumbling into my now regular coffee shop knowing only a few hours earlier I was standing on the other side of the country (Phoenix to San Francisco to Newark). I was fried for my 11am meeting in Manhattan, but it still went well. I was two coffees in before my 1:30p back in Brooklyn, but again, it went well too.

Philadelphia for a Night and Day

Just before moving to New York a client I've worked with the last few years reached out about a quick shoot in Philadelphia. No question – let's go. I knew I'd already be in Brooklyn by then, so I did the normal thing and looked for flights, this time out of New York City. Google Maps made fun of me and let me know Philadelphia is a two-hour drive from the city.

"Don't be dumb, get a rental car." - Google Maps (pretty much).

Booking a car and picking it up in my neighborhood – easy. Driving in and around NYC and trying to park – I'd rather lose a fingertip in a fight with a table saw.

Not having to fly my gear on this shoot allowed a bit of wiggle room with my grip and electric budget. All the cool kids on the internet shoot with those fancy Quasar LED tubes but it's tough getting your hands on those Jedi laser swords in Oklahoma City. This is where Lightbulb Grip & Electric comes in. By far they were more than accommodating in my small order and made sure I had what I needed and knew how to use it. They set me up with two 4' Quasar Crossfades, dimmers, clamps, and c-stands.

After more than an hour trying to drive the four or so miles from Park Slope to the other side of Brooklyn to pick up the gear at Lightbulb, I was off to Philadelphia and working up fresh 'Yo Momma' jokes for the next table saw I came across. Good lord it was weird being out of the city after not being more than six to eight miles from my apartment for nearly a month.

It was dark when I got to my hotel in downtown Philadelphia and paid the $30 for overnight parking. I bundled up and headed out with a camera instead of camping out in my room because, again, that's what the cool kids do (I'm told). Word to the wise, the National Park Service Rangers – or at least the hired overnight security guards – will yell at you if you're walking too close to the chain railing on the street next to Independence Hall. Also, make sure your headphones aren't up too loud so you can hear them yell at you the first time. Oh, and they're not up for jokes if you're trying to lighten the mood and get them to stop yelling at you.

The shoot the next morning and the reason I was in Philadelphia went very well. We were shooting another two-camera interview for a series of client videos. It's not like these things come with a built-in location scout, so I showed up with my normal Rock-N-Roller cart full of gear. Thank goodness for carts. We had to park in a garage a couple blocks away and then use a service elevator to get where we needed to be in another building. Luckily I was able to get all my nonsense from the car to where it needed to be in one trip.

So those Quasars... I'm a fan. We were shooting in a white room with plenty of daylight bouncing around. If I'd just had my trusty tungsten ARRI kit (650/300/150) I'd be freaking out knowing the gel and diffusion death march I'd be putting it through in getting the color and softness I wanted while praying it still had enough horsepower to overcome the ambient light coming through the windows. Those Quasar Crossfades were soft and bright, and I was able to quickly dial in the color temperature to what I wanted. They also weren't hot so the talent wasn't melting and I didn't have to wait for them to cool off before packing up. They felt a bit more magenta than I was used to, but that could've been how my monitor was set up. I've heard the color temp warms up a bit as they're dimmed down, but I had them at full blast. Seemingly the only butt-pain in using these lights in a travel kit would be hauling around c-stands; surely there's an easy solution to that.

Clara the dog is up here with me in NYC and needed to be boarded overnight while I was gone. That was a whole thing too, but it was a great experience with both the neighborhood vet's office and the actual boarding facility. I'm assuming you're not here to read about my dog, but I will say she had a good time riding the subway. You're not supposed to have a dog on the train without them being in some kind of carrier – which again is a whole thing – but she immediately made friends on the train and surely made it on at least one more Instagram account.

Latenights @ Lightbulb: Metro Camera Cars

So straight up one of my big attractions to New York City is the concentration of filmmakers and opportunities to make stuff. Good grief the number of emails, direct messages, and coffee meetings I've been able to make over the last few weeks has been fantastic. One of those coffee meetings was with a guy I met during the Film+Music Conference in Ft. Worth this past September. Dustin Ward is a Brooklyn-based filmmaker and cool enough to point me to Lighbulb Grip & Electric. Along with being a rental house, they do these free events called Late Nights @ Lightbulb: Free Education for Filmmakers, by Filmmakers. Up this past week was Metro Camera Cars.

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Just a heads up, this isn't a paid post. I've not worked with these guys, but I did get a chance to meet them. They've got a cool thing going and I'm down with what they're trying to do.

By no means am I swimming in budgets with cash to burn. I've had projects where we needed a driving shot and I've done my fair share of "let's-hang-the-camera-guy-out-the-car" setups to – hopefully – get what we needed. More often than not it wasn't safe, the shot looks like garbage, and again, hanging someone out of a car isn't safe. The guys at Metro Camera Cars are out to make "high-end, dynamic, fluid camera movement accessible for all budgets... With skilled drivers and technicians, [their] goal is to increase your production value while decreasing risk."

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Cutting to the chase on all this, they've got a fully motorized jib arm with a DJI Ronin 2 attached to the business end of it – you provide the camera and lens package. That whole setup is attached to a blacked-out Honda Fit piloted by a stunt driver and filled with all kinds of gadgets and crew to make all the fluid and dynamic camera movement nonsense happen. Through their presentation, they ran us through their gear, the basics of working with a camera car, and a solid Q&A session. Afterward, we all bundled up and went outside to actually see the setup. I've included my notes from the talk below.

Am I planning to hire out a camera car for an upcoming shoot? No. Do I now have a better idea as to what goes into a shoot with a camera car and a group to reach out to that would do a great job, especially with a tighter budget? Yes. Oh, and did I meet a solid handful of likeminded people who I may get a chance to work with at some point? Again, yes.

Becoming an Old Freelancer: Community

Community is fresh on my mind following this past weekend's Film + Music Conference in Ft. Worth, Texas. If you've not heard of it, it's worth booking your tickets now for next year's event.

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My experience as a freelancer has me spending the VAST majority of my time alone. On a typical weekday, I'll help get St. Anne the Wife and our two boys out the door and off to school/work just after 7am. By 7:30am, I'm at one of my regular coffee shops in the Oklahoma City area reading, writing, and plowing through emails thanks to a cup of coffee that'll typically be cold before I'm finished. Around 9:30-10am it’s back to the house to continue working until Anne and the boys get home by 5pm. On most weekdays my local coffee shop is literally the only time and place I'll see someone other than my wife and kids.

Obviously, there are production days, errands, and face-to-face client interactions, but having that much alone is something I didn't expect when leaving my last full-time job back in January 2011. Unquestionably I miss having that built-in work family. They still hire me as a freelancer now and then and though it's been almost eight years they still feel like extended family members.

My work family now is a loosely connected group of other freelancers, clients, and vendors mostly in Oklahoma City and Tulsa, but also across the country. There are seasons where I'm on the road with clients and crew anywhere from a couple days up to multiple weeks at a time. Those shared experiences allow you to develop stronger relationships, but afterward, you each go your separate ways not knowing if and when you’ll ever see each other again. Thankfully I've kept in touch over the years with those I've connected with across the country and around the world, but it takes intentional effort to maintain those relationships through email, text messages, phone calls, etc.

Events like the Film + Music Conference are gold to me. You're able to sharpen your craft by learning from industry leaders, but connecting face-to-face with other creatives is where it's at. Networking events still make this self-described introvert cringe, but the immediate urge to vomit and curl up into a fetal position has lessened the more I’ve forced myself to suck it up and introduce myself to new people. It helps to know they're probably feeling the same way at the same time.

I'd love to say that this is an industry based on merit and ability, but it's one of relationships and self-motivation. You’d better believe I read and re-read this New York Times article about How to be Better at Parties before heading off to last weekend’s conference.

Becoming an Old Freelancer: Mental & Emotional Health

Originally, the idea of sustainability and becoming an Older Freelancer dealt mostly – I thought – with finances. I'm on the back side of my thirties at this point and spending more and more time thinking about what this line of work looks like into my 40s, 50s, and past that.

Not sure what this looks like to you, but if you're planning to stick around as a freelancer – especially if you're married and/or have kids – you’ve got to be intentional about keeping your mental and emotional well-being in check. Obviously, freelance creatives aren't the only ones susceptible to depression and anxiety issues, but as a freelancer myself I've gone through it, I know that it's a thing, and learned ways to cope with it.

I do want to add that I'm happily married to my best friend and we've got two young boys. My mental and emotional health very much impacts our home life as well as our friends and family and the people I get to work with.

By no means am I a qualified medical and/or mental health professional, but there are plenty of people who are. Just know that help is out there. I went through a season of deep depression after college and came out in a better place thanks to a licensed professional counselor. I've also gone through a short season of taking prescription medication to help with depression. I've had quite a few conversations with other freelancers over the years and I know I'm not alone in dealing with anxiety and depression. Thank God I lucked out and got a wife who can read me and knows when I'm close to my mental and emotional limits.

There are seasons where I’m a hot mess emotionally and the winter and early spring are typically the toughest. Seasonal Affective Disorder is a real thing. The aftermath of holiday bills is a thing too. Oh, and the typical client work and cashflow slowdown after the holidays isn't helpful either.

You've got to figure out your thing. For me, my mental and emotional panacea during the winter and early spring is running. Those first few years in full-time freelancing were especially tough and I started running as a mental break while preparing for the LSAT exam. I figured law school would help me to become an adult and get a "real job," but the best things to come out of that season of studying were knowing I didn't need to be in law school and the importance of healthy mental breaks now and then.

Since I started running in the fall of 2011, I've run two full marathons and six half-marathons. The Oklahoma City Memorial Marathon is in late April, so the training schedule starting January 1 each year with the OKC Running Club is quite the antithesis of my seasonal depression. Running allows me to veg out and just focus on breathing and not falling down vs. being mentally overwhelmed by family, personal, and professional responsibilities. I know all those things will still be there when I finish my run, but that break is a godsend.

Some less physically demanding coping mechanisms are spending time with friends outside my family and work circles, my Moleskine notebook, and foam earplugs. As a parent with young kids, I don't get as much time outside work and family, so those times are gold. Journalling has always been an outlet for me to mentally work through the good and the bad of whatever is going on. The earplugs are there when I need some quiet and help focusing.

Another means of keeping myself in check knowing when to shut off social media. Theodore Roosevelt's "comparison is the thief of joy" is a much more eloquent way of saying "comparison is a bitch." I typically distance myself from people who are self-promoters and opportunists, so I tend to not follow accounts that are the same. The other day I saw a couple Instagram Story posts dealing with anxiety from Oren Soffer that I thought were helpful.

"...[don't] let yourself get overwhelmed with how big the pond is[.] You just have to focus on your own work and making your own little corner of the pond as prosperous and enjoyable as possible, and avoid as much as you can getting bogged down with comparing yourself to any of the other fish."

"...someone once said that a cinematography career is a marathon, not a sprint. ...when you run a marathon, unlike a sprint or another foot race, you're not actually competing against the other runners; you're only competing against your own best time. ...remind yourself to stay in your lane and focus on your own career, and not keep looking at other people's marathons..."

Becoming an Old Freelancer: Finances

Sustainability as a freelancer is something I don't think gets enough attention. It's not flashy and for sure doesn't make for a good Instagram post. Still, to stick around you've got to try and figure out what works for you and your situation.

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If you know me at all, you'll know I'm always up to talk about money. Not in the "Hey plebeian! Look what I've got!" way but more in the mindset of "You're in this hot mess too?! What are you doing?! Is it working? Is there a way we can learn from each other?"

The last few weeks have been a welcomed whirlwind. I've broken record'd the battle cry of "Oh man, I'm so busy" and I'm absolutely aware of it. What's freakin' awesome though is the fact that money is coming through the doors and for that, I'm insanely thankful. Freelance is "feast or famine" and I know the financial spigot could shut off for a season at any point.

Turns out it's expensive AF to be a freelancer, especially as you get further into your career. The amount of overhead I've accumulated over the years running this freelance operation is DUMB. Thinking back to when this whole thing started as a side hustle back in 2004-ish I'd have never imagined the amount of money it takes to keep this up plus trying to be intentional about the future.

At times it feels like I'm working just to keep up: production insurance, health insurance for me and our two boys, plus life and disability insurance. Then there's the money set aside for taxes and retirement accounts. Oh, then there's paying off bank loans, paying myself every two weeks, phone and internet bills, and on and on and on. It's dumb.

Positive side note: I paid off my car today – several months early BTW – so that's rad.

The biggest leg up I've had in terms of money management as a freelancer has come from a book I read back in 2010-11-ish – The Money Book for Freelancers, Part-Timers, and the Self-Employed.

Here are some of my biggest takeaways from the book:

"If you’re trying to create financial security as an independent worker, but you are following guidelines that are designed for traditional workers, you’re going to get yourself into trouble."

"They [percentages] are the best - and really only - way to save consistently based on what you actually earn, especially when what you earn varies widely and doesn’t arrive on a predictable schedule."

This was the biggest thing for me. As a former full-time employee, I was used to working on a very specific budget with close to exact numbers. Unlike my wife's very reliable paycheck each month, there's no way to know the specific amount that my freelance work will be bringing in each month. I've already written about using past records to help me predict my busy and slow seasons, but that's still just an educated guess. In planning ahead financially, I stick with setting aside 15% of my profits to pay my taxes as well as 10% to put towards retirement. I've been slowly and steadily stashing money into a RothIRA since I was 21 as well as another RothIRA under my wife's name as I max out the first one each year.

"If you don’t pay yourself first, you probably won’t do it at all."

"Debt is by far the biggest threat to both your career and your stability and stands between you and your success."

"Debt is sucking the money from your present to pay for your past at the expense of your future."

"If you don't save for your retirement, no one else will."

"Being an independent worker means you have to save more, plain and simple."

Still Busy (but not much to show for it)

The original goal of this weekly blog project was to set up artificial deadlines and force myself to regularly work on and post new content. Google said we're 34 weeks into 2018 and I think I've only missed one week so far.

I'm itching to work on another personal project but THANKFULLY I'm still swimming client projects that are paying the bills in an otherwise very slow year. Oh, and it's the start of the school year so Anne the Wife – an elementary school teacher – has been busy getting situated and I've had both the boys more than usual.

The last two to three weeks have been a bit of an outlier and had me crazy busy: shooting in Oklahoma City for a group from Wichita, KS; producing, directing, shooting, and currently editing a commercial campaign with a longtime OKC client; shooting in West Virginia with a Tulsa based agency; shooting a multi-cam project in OKC that'll need to be edited soon; shooting in OKC with a group I've never worked with based out of New York. Oh, and there's the pre-production part of a good deal of stuff on the horizon.

By no means am I complaining about being busy – far from it. It's not always rainbows and sunshine, but good grief I'm insanely thankful for people and organizations willing to pay me for work I love doing. I'll rant about waiting for invoices to be paid, but that'll have to wait for another day.

In this world of "if there's no pic it didn't happen," it's frustrating to not always have something to show that you're actually working. There's no reason for me to show you what my pre-production process looks like – unless you're up to see me sitting in front of a pile of notebooks and my computer at a coffee shop. I don't have behind-the-scenes images from being on sets mostly because I'm focused on the people and the work and don't always have the margin to share it on social media. No one cares how many recent trips I've made to FedEx and the local rental house to pick up and drop off rental equipment. There's no reason to post another image from an airplane or gripe about the flight attendant making you gate-check your camera bag even after the last one on the same plane didn't.

All that being said, I still jealously collect – and try to learn from – piles of screen grabs from other DPs and Directors posting this kind of nonsense to their Instagram accounts.

This is an insanely visual world that's constantly whispering to our insecurities, "You're only as good as your last project/image."