Coffee, Cards, and a Goatee.

...I went for a walk, on this freaking cold winter's day.

In other news, G and I are planning yet another special, which is already promising to be better than the first. When Tarantino was asked about his first movie (not Reservoir Dogs, you QT newbies), My Best Friend's Birthday, he replied that it shouldn't be seen by anyone. Even he, a master of cinematics, acknowledges that your first time out is always your first time out, and that it is a necessary evil. You have to learn from that experience before you can go on to make anything truly worthwhile. You figure out what works and what doesnt, you find your own way of expressing certain things with particular elements that work well for YOU, and you also experience the strange fact that the camera is not a replacement for a human eye. It never blinks, it is unforgiving, and it captures everything. So you have to cater to that. To that wit, I present to you my list of Things We Know After Magic/Mirror:

1. All film ventures need a focus and a theory. Even if that focus is to not focus on anything, it needs to be explicitly stated and carried out. Magic/Mirror kind of walked a very blurry line between magic special and magic documentary, and I don't think it turned out as well as it could have. It was confusing, and confusion is usually just boring unless done correctly, which we are not smart enough to figure out. Yet.
2. Things will go wrong. No matter what you try to do, if it involves a lens and a person, something is going to happen. Whether this is a small thing or a big thing is left in the air, but something will impede your progress, and you need to be prepared for it. Example: always film the actual proceedings BEFORE the introduction to said proceedings. And never be afraid to test things out 1,000 times before. Regardless, it will always fail on the 1,001st time.
3. Audiences can think. There's no need to lead them by the hand through your film. They'll fill in the gaps and figure stuff out for themselves. In fact, that's what makes or breaks a lot of great movies -- giving the audience room to just think. The structure to Magic/Mirror was good for the documentary we had originally planned, but for the part of it that was a magic special, it was almost...demeaning. I.e. - "Hey, we're going to do some card magic now", and then there I am with the cards. I think they understood that point already.
4. Tripods are heavy.
5. Never leave your camera alone in a room with curious people abounding. Shit happens.
6. Just when you're about to give up on something, give it one more try. No, give it ten more tries. Trust me, if you knew how many times we wanted to give up on that balloon swallowing thing...but we perservered, and its probably my favorite part of the entire movie.
7. People are generally good-natured and want to help, but you have to understand that you are invading their space, and they have no idea who you are running over with a camera. Always be cordial and get permission first. We learned this one quickly.
8. Coffee is your friend. Coffee understands you. Coffee will save your soul.
9. It's always important to always think of your work as unfinished. Never be satisfied. And when you are satisfied, assume something is wrong. That being said, don't second guess yourself, and know when you have a good thing, and leave it as that. Its a strange balance. A magician once told me that the best way to look at your routines is to perfect it as much as possible, then don't look at it for at least a week. Once you've more or less forgotten a lot of it, pick it up, and pretend that it was written by the biggest hack in the world. Pretend it was written by someone who didn't know the first thing about anything. Treat it like shit. Then, assume that you know much more than the person who wrote this offensive bullshit, and revise it and make it better. Repeat the process a few times. You'd be surprised how freaking well this works.
10. Finally, if you're going to be shooting in a public place (and we ALWAYS are), choose your times carefully. Too many people and the noise and commotion is distracting. Too few, and it looks like you just broke into someone's house. No people is fine, but set the scene nicely. Basically, make it look like a place where a program of your nature should be set.

I'll be posting more updates about this project as they arise - but trust me, it'll be a good one. We've been doing one other thing that I forgot to put in that list: thinking. We've been brainstorming and planning and not rushing into anything, and we're kick-ass. I think this one's gonna be a good one. And it's going places. More on that if/when it happens.

Oh, and Heather's here 'til Saturday morning, and its awesome. So as you can tell, between those two things, I'm a happy little movie-maker.