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clarity of thought

I don't know why I cared about what people thought so much.

I kept waking up a couple nights ago, you know... one of those roll over, look at the clock, oh 2am, OK, back to sleep, roll over 3:30, 4:45, 5:50, oh crap, have to get up soon, 7:10 late for work... nope, sleep in Saturday but can't sleep in even thought I'm dead tired and stressed kind of nights. I had tested the online store in preperation for Tuesday's public release but couldn't make 100% sure the conversion rate from a US purchase to Canadian dollars was working yet and a friend of mine mentioned ( as her husband and I were getting ready to go out shooting ) that she sat by someone at the movie premiere who made a comment about there not being any guns in the movie. Out of the hundreds of emails I've received two other people mentioned the same thing, one of them saying when women do that they are labeled a dick tease. ( I didn't take the comment very well, along with the other things she mentioned.)

I lay in bed thinking about the artsy scrapbookers who wanted more art stuff, the digi scrappers who felt like there needed to be more digital stuff, the people who gave me grief about having a gun in the promo and the people giving me grief because there weren't any guns in the movie ( one of the people who, upon first meeting me immediately said, say your promos. Interesting, funny but we have very different opinions about guns was also one of the people saying they were surprised and a little disappointed there weren't guns in the movie ) people that said I needed to skip all the "boring stuff" in the beginning, and by beginning I can only assume they mean the first 70 minutes and get to the meat, the "stuff people really want to see" which was the interviews. Then there's the people that don't really know or care a lot about scrapbooking that seem to like the beginning where a logical / reasoning approach says why the building blocks are important. On and on.

I had gotten an email that day as well from a woman who was at a local scrapbook store and was talking to a friend of hers who saw scrapped at a retreat with a bunch of other women and heard it was good. Her friend told her it was hilarious and that they she should see it. She said she "would love to have a copy or two to leave up there for my guests. It would be a great promotion for you as well!" and then closed the email with "I assume it's a good clean movie?" My knee jerk reaction is, here's a crazy idea... why don't you break the bank, spend $15, buy it and watch it first? That's fine that people are buying a single copy and showing it to a dozen other people. That shows they like it and it's the common way thigns are done. The movie industry is losing their shorts to that kind of thing and it's just part of life. I have no problem with that because I am banking on 1 in 15 or 20 people that see it, liking it and actually buying it. I'm hoping that by releasing something on DVD to the average Joe or Jane Doe instead of trying to get it in theaters and then having people paying $9 apiece to watch it, they will spend $15 to watch it on DVD and get to keep it afterwards.



So I'm lying in bed tossing and turning wondering if I've blown it on the gun thing, on the art or digital thing, on the sell DVD's off the internet thing and trying to do something different with distribution, etc. if I should be sending out free copies to people that want them if they work in the industry because one of my whole things I always print on the stuff I make is that if you don't have the cash to buy one, I'll send you one if you ask. Don't copy because I'm trying to make a million bucks... don't copy it because your copy won't be a s good of quality as the real one that's all. No packaging artwork or crappy video / audio. So I was also wondering if I'm being a hypocrite with the scrapbook retreat place.

This morning I got up and played the bass for the little neighborhood Lutheran Church I go to ( yes, it has a lot of similairities to the whole Garrision Keillor, Lake Wobegon thing ) and was just Wes working on his current project. Balance and being grounded are under rated because they aren't always a juicy story. I remembered that it was only months ago when none of this exhisted. As far as I know nobody had ever thought or talked about doing any scrapbooking docu-thing with a guy from the outside. There was literally nothing in exhistance like it so when it comes right down to it everybody, not just me, has to make their own decisions and take their successes and mistakes ( insert Frank Sinatra or Sid Vicious singing "I did it my way here.) In the grand scheme of things if Scrapped explodes into a million pieces then I go do some commercial work to pay it off and I've learned a ton along the way and if people don't like it for one reason or another then they can make their own damn movie. ;0)

Truth be told I'm already overjoyed about the emails I get from people like "my husband decided to sit down and watch it with me and we both cried" or the large number of people who either feel freed up to try scrapbooking, don't feel stressed about doing it more often or even just feel motivated to spend more time writing down stories from their parents or relatives. That's a cool thing and what I need to focus on: connectiong with viewers, not every single viewer... that's impossible, but balance and perspective of who I am, who others are and the common ground we share.

posted by wes @ 9:11 PM