-
Life Is What Happens When You’re Busy Making Other Plans
I wrote a journal entry today, or I suppose now it was yesterday and I’ve been musing on it. I just finished reading “Love in the Time of Cholera”, a recommendation from a good friend, and while it wouldn’t normally be my go-to, I found it thought-provoking. It wasn’t a love-story but it was a very real representation of what life may look like if we don’t stop to evaluate, appreciate or introspect. The truly beautiful bit is that we get to live into that quiet desperation, feel the feelings of regret and be steamrolled by the inexorable passing of time, and then we get to set the book down…
-
Video Marketing and Efficiency
Construction Wisdom I learned a very valuable lesson while working for my dad’s swimming pool company. While the muscles I gained picking up 94 pound bags of Portland cement gave me feelings of confidence, and the tolerance for being sweaty/dirty/hot gave me a “get ‘er done” attitude, if you’d asked me what’s the biggest lesson I learned, it would be this: If you need to go to the truck to grab a tool, what can you bring BACK to the truck? We need to make the trip, yes, but that is a minute or three we’re not getting any work done. Is there a way to make that time count…
-
Get More and Better Work Done : 5 Takeaways from Cal Newport’s “Deep Work”
There are two abilities necessary for success in the New Economy: the ability to quickly master hard things and the ability to produce at an elite level. Both depend on your ability to perform deep work.
-
Change Your Default Settings
When you first get your camera, it’s typically set to “Auto”. Your camera has default settings telling the camera how to take the picture. You get automatic decisions made about how bright the photo is, how saturated (full of color) it is, the range of colors, how much of the photo will be in focus etc etc. Now, don’t get me wrong, you can get GREAT results on auto. BUT. The magic happens when you know enough to change your settings. The magic happens when you know what each of your options mean and what you need to manipulate to cultivate the results you want. I may have achieved the…
-
2019 DragonCon Video Highlight Reel
If you had seen a few months back, I stated that at Dragoncon this year, I would be focused on improving my videography skills. The plan was to bull doze into many new areas in all of pre-production, production AND in post. Specifically I worked on: In-Camera transitions. (see 0:23 the TARDIS to Dcon sign, 0:49 the punch and Phazon Pixie Cosplay’s change in costume, 1:16 the dice to drone shot, and 2:22 the glasses to cosplay photo shoot) Crazy editing effects I’ve never tried before (0:00 with the strobe effect, and the flashing between scenes – also used throughout) This also includes the super fast pace this video took…
-
I’m not cosplaying at Dragon*Con 2019 and here’s why
Last year I went to Dragon*Con 2018 for the first time after being completely jealous on September 3, 2017 when my friends who had went told me all the fun things they had done. When I went last year, I brought costumes with me and during the four days I was there became Regular Sailor Jupiter Punk Sailor Jupiter Lady Loki and Dustin of Stranger Things Why then, am I not cosplaying this year? Feel free to watch the vlog I created on just that. 🙂 Cliff notes version? I want to focus my efforts on creating an epic travel vlog. Boo-yah.
-
What are your Three Words?
Happy Independence Day to America! I would also like to wish a “Happy Independence Day” to everyone who realizes their destiny is forever in their hands. No matter how our hands are or feel bound, our thoughts are always our own. Today has reminded me of an activity the illustrious Tress Hotzel of https://tresshotzel.com led us through at a recent coaching event in Ann Arbor which was an echo of the same activity the magical Sandi Maki of https://www.sandimaki.com ran our team through in January. What are your three words? What three words capture the essence of you? What ideals speak to your inner most essence? Happiness? Love? Joy? Trust?…
-
Permission to Speak? Granted.
I am blessed to know so many amazing and inspirational people! One of them, Nick Suino of https://nicklaus-suino.com put on a kick-butt day-long event and asked me to speak. So I did! I come to the stage at 2:36 I talk a bit about my story and how asking “What’s the worst that can happen” while either making consistent small steps or jumping head first into something helps to develop us into the person that we aspire to be.
-
Your Life is a Movie and You are the Editor
The Director may have the vision, and the Camera Operator may capture the shot, but it is the Editor who decides how the story flows, where the scenes appear, which shots gets seen and which don’t. We are all Editors – irrespective of whether we make videos for our selves/businesses or not, we are all Editors because we are all editing the movie that is our life. Will we see that person again? Did they move the plot forward? Are they contributing to our character growth? We decide the supporting actors who push us in our character arc. We can also decide to cut those that do not move our…
-
My Best Life Speech : Inspired (video)
I forgot to post this on my blog! Oh no! Last month I spoke at the Best Life Summit in Durham, North Carolina – it took me a long time to come up with what I wanted to say, but I’m pretty pleased with how it turned out – even if I haven’t exactly watched myself give the speech… Video Transcript : Emcee: And next up we have Katie Curtis. She’s from Michigan. She’s an undercover princess with an eye of a videographer, and right now she’s just finished a movie called The Pirate Pool movie, which the main character is a dog. If you don’t believe her you…
Inspired Stories. Inspired Videos. Inspired Lives.
