When I first started this blog I posted some of my favorite director quotes in the sidebar to act as inspiration in pursuing my own goals. While I still consider these quotes to be great sources of inspiration, I'm removing them from my sidebar as part of my clean-up and reconstruction, and instead am posting them here for memories sake.
In my opinion these are still some of the best filmmaker quotes I've come across. Charles Chaplin
"Failure is unimportant. It takes courage to make a fool of yourself."
Martin Scorsese
"Now more than ever we need to talk to each other, to listen to each other and understand how we see the world, and cinema is the best medium for doing this."
Steven Soderbergh
"Making a film that's supposed to be fun to watch is really hard - that's the weird irony of it."
Francis Ford Coppola
"The essence of cinema is editing. It's the combination of what can be extraordinary images of people during emotional moments, or images in a general sense, put together in a kind of alchemy."
Robert Zemeckis
"I won an Academy Award when I was 44 years old, but I paid for it with my 20s. That decade of my life from film school till 30 was nothing but work, nothing but absolute, driving work. I had no money. I had no life."
I want to thank everyone for the personal messages, emails, and facebook messages I received about my latest Christmas short, We Two Kings. I don't think I've ever heard the words 'cute' or 'adorable' to describe one of my shorts as often, but under the circumstances, my movie was intended to give people warm fuzzies for the holidays so I'll accept that as positive feedback, haha.
Also notable were the comments about how great the project looked. Like I said in the post, I couldn't have lucked out more with the fresh snow and great weather for a day to shoot. Even I have to admit, the overall look - fake crowns and all - surpassed my own creative expectations.
And finally, a lot of you commented on my quirky and irreverent humor - thank you! haha. I couldn't have summed it up better myself, and I'd be lying to say that awkward comedy isn't a personal favorite of mine. Tyler and I play well off each other and I think it shows in the projects he's helped me with.
We Two Kings has proven to be a great way for me to close out 2009 and welcome Christmas. Thanks to all of you for checking it out and sharing your feedback, it's been a lot of fun to receive (and please feel free to send more). At this point it's a long way off, but as several of you asked, sequel anyone?
With my new portfolio site launching in just a few weeks, changes are being made all the way down the line to create the best possible online experience for those who want to watch, read, and explore my content.
The new site, part portfolio/part personal scrapbook, is going to act as a hub for all my online material. This blog, my YouTube channel, my complete works, Contact info, and much more will all be linked together for the first time on a single page. Accessing any video will be as simple as clicking my portfolio and scrolling the posters, sending me a personal email can be done directly through the new site, and the latest updates on this very blog will be automatically streaming on the main page so you can see if you've already read my latest post. Aside from being more efficient, this entire process is about representing myself to the fullest. I want people to take interest in my videos and I want to make it easier and more enjoyable to find them. This is also about creating a cohesive look and brand for everything I do - a personal stamp - both literally and figuratively.
Editing Luke (the blog) will be getting a swanky new look along with an overhaul of some of the links and photos. This blog will become slightly more casual in the presence of a site that can adapt to my need for promotion - though don't kid yourself, blogs are meant to be self indulgent and I'll still be updating, haha.
I haven't even organized my YouTube account in months. With over 100 videos uploaded I think a re-design of my channel is likely to happen also.
It's exciting to feel like after several years of utilizing the Internet for my videos, I'm at a point where everything feels new again. I've done my trial run and had some mid-level successes, but this is a step up to the next plateau. If for nothing else, the feeling of consolidating everything I do creatively online makes this seem worth all the effort.
Watch for some big changes across the board as we countdown to the new decade, and be sure to comeback to see the brand new home site unveiled on January 1, 2010! Until then, consider everything to be under construction.
