Posts Tagged Courageous Movie
Let The Good Times Roll
Sometimes it’s easy to remember just how good I have it. Do you ever feel that way? Denise and I went to go see Courageous for a second time today at a local pre-screening. I can’t believe I get to do this stuff for a living…being involved in the filmmaking industry full-time. It still blows my mind. 5 years ago I was graduating high school and looking to go into college for engineering. After only a year there I dropped out and working full-time at my church as the media director, then in 2007 Praise Pictures starts…Standing Firm is birthed then then from Aug 2010 is a whirlwind of stress, blessing, tears, love, etc. and now 9 months later I find myself in 2011 married with a baby on the way and an impending move to Atlanta. A lot can happen in 5 years, wow.
The article I wrote on Social Media Marketing for WorkbookProject.com hasn’t been posted yet but I’ll definitely post it here when the time comes. Hopefully it’s useful for people! I’ve finished that Roy Rogers Cover recently for BMG and moving onto the other one due in a month for Adventures In Values which is a children’s program. I’ve done two other covers for their show and this one is a three-volume set. After that another program called Our House I guess is in the queue box for me to do. For any of you looking to make a living at some of this stuff I can tell you it’s really helpful to build good relationships and find those few clients who can give you repeated jobs because it only takes a few of those to carry through a year and this year that’s happening.
I’ve been feeling a little lazy though and that’s probably due to the fact I’m not going nuts like I was in Jan-Feb. Sometimes I feel like the pace is normal but some days I really think I get almost nothing done and somehow hours just fly by without a load of work being completed. I’m behind with developing Chasing Glory and it’s May already! Not sure what’s wrong with me. As I said before I think I need a bit more structure but getting it started is tough. It’s 2am again and I’m writing here so as you can see I’m failing at my goal setting LOL.
I have spent some time during my days doing tests with my AF100 still. Recently I did a ton of tests to get the AF100 scene file settings I have matched with my Canon 5D. The point of doing that is so I can shoot the same subject with either and as long as the exposure matches they should grade almost exactly the same and look exactly the same in post-production. I’ve gotten them probably 95% matched with the other 5% being negligible and not likely to be noticed by anyone besides me. I’ve thought hard about how to utilize the tools out there and squeeze every last drop of quality from what’s available similar to how I did Standing Firm. The 5D for instance will be perfect for a B-camera when it’s needed, possibly to get shots in places the AF100 would attract too much attention, small crane shots where the wide aspect of my 5D’s lens (due to the large chip sensor) would give me something my AF100 couldn’t do without a really wide lens (although that’s on my list to buy). There’s a lot of application here and I need to be mindful of all of it if I hope to do another lower budget film a step up from Standing Firm’s quality. I look forward to seeing how some of this stuff can work out, but my story really needs to take priority and lately I think I’ve been letting the techie inside of me take over. The writer needs to come out!
I got my car back from the shop today, and I’m $1500 poorer. It needed a ton of stuff done to it and since inspection was due I needed to replace the windshield that cracked during the winter simply due to the cold which added to the cost. It’s wonderful after almost 2 months to have my car back though and to drive it. It’s smooth as butter and I miss it. I even miss the seat in my car, which just shows you how attached you can get to a vehicle and your body especially. My neck hurt a lot in Denise’s car and in mine I feel great…weird.
Eyes hurt, time to go to bed!
Baby Prohaska?
Just in case you hadn’t seen the facebook status and photo I put up a day or so ago, Denise and I are going to have a baby! 
Anyone who’s been following this blog for the last few years knows how much I’ve wanted to get married and have a family of my own. It’s a really surreal thing to realize that in December of this year I’ll officially be a father. That’s a scary but exciting reality and it’s already started some of the pressure to get some things together LOL. I’m already feeling like I haven’t studied the Word as much as I should, and I haven’t been spending money like I should, etc. Even if those things were false and I’m doing fine, it’s just easy to go crazy. Denise hasn’t been feeling that great at all with her sleeping and feeling sick most of the last week and a half or so. She’s pretty much been down for the count. We don’t have a doctor yet so we need to find one ASAP.
The more we talk about Georgia the more and more our talk of it morphs into a sure thing. We’ve just started talking like it’s happening and looking at life here in NY in light of that. That puts on some more pressure since Denise will be like 7 months pregnant in October when we had planned to go. Moving with a pregnant woman will be crazy enough, but moving with a new born baby is simply impossible. If we don’t go now, we’ll never get out of here. The housing situation still isn’t known. Basically we have the possibility of getting a house to rent that’s newly remodeled without a lot of strings attached, or we’ll have to get an apartment. We’re hoping for the house but you never know how things can work out. Finding an apartment will be annoying since it’ll be a temporary fix to a bigger problem. We need three bedrooms if we hope to keep our sanity because I need a space to work, ship, etc., and we both need a place to sleep as does the baby. I’ve known some to live in the same bedroom with the baby but I feel like that’s going to be more trouble than its worth, LOL. The cost of a 3 bedroom apartment is the same as a house most of the time, so it would just be a stepping stone whatever we find. The church I’ve been researching down there we’re both really excited about and continue to be the more we think about it. It’s called Christ Reformed Church and is about 30mins away from where we’ll likely be (Snellville, GA about 30mins outside downtown Atlanta). Their doctrinal statement is amazing, they’re family integrated, and they’re size is modest and something I’m used to. I’ve already emailed the pastor and spoken to him just to put the feelers out and see what kind of response I would get. I feel really good about this place but you never know until you attend. Finding a Reformed church that is supportive of family in the way this one is isn’t common. I look forward to getting back into a congregation that is more expository in the way they preach as well.
Please pray for my grandfather who had a stroke a matter of days ago and fell in a parking lot all by himself. Nobody knew it happened and he managed to get back to his car but sat there for a few hours before anybody found him and called an ambulance. My parents just drove in from Georgia to see how my grandma is and to visit him. Pray for the salvation of my grandparents. This will be hard on my grandma and my dad especially. The last I heard an update from my mom he was very disoriented and his memory a little fuzzy. That’s a bad sign but I haven’t heard of he’s doing OK now. We’ll find out more tomorrow. Either way it’s pretty scary and we really haven’t had anything like this happen in our family for as far back as I can remember.
On tuesday Denise and I fly out to Tupelo, MS to visit the American Family Association and be at the screening for Sherwood’s new film COURAGEOUS. I’m very excited to see the film and meet up with some friends there, and make some new ones! I guess my buddy there setup some time for me on the radio with AFR’s JJ Jasper on Wednesday morning so if you’re listening in perhaps you’ll hear me? To be honest I don’t know much about it, except that I need to get up pretty early. I hope our flights are on time and that it’s low stress. I’m not big on traveling and especially flying so I just hope all goes well. Special thanks to the AFA for their generosity and for being so accommodating!
I’m also pleased to report that I finished that Roy Rogers DVD Cover. Now I need to scramble to get the other cover done before a deadline, LOL. The cover for Roy Rogers came out AWESOME, and I’m very excited to add this one on my portfolio. It’s got a very cool and rich feel to it that I love. 
Who would’ve thought after all that worrying that it would come out so great? I got it done in like two days too, just like I figured. It’s funny when I finally see what I need to do I just sprint to the finish line. Too bad parenting won’t always be that way huh? Expect some interesting posts in the future in that regard, haha! I’m reading Steve Farrar’s Anchor Man over again right now, and plan on reading quite a few books this year to prepare my heart/mind as much as I can for this beautiful gift God is giving my wife and I.
On the STANDING FIRM front, we just released the Soundtrack of the film for download on iTunes! People have already started downloading some of the songs from the film that they were asking me about, particularly the end credits song called “Overcome.” It’s a fantastic song and I listen to it all the time! God is also opening some possible doors for STANDING FIRM on DVD far beyond what we’ve seen it do already, and that blows my mind. I found myself in shock after an email last friday, but I can’t tell you right now! I’m such a tease huh? Nothing is for certain yet anyways, so it could be nothing, but time and again God has taken this movie to heights I never would’ve dreamed. Perhaps he’s planning to take it just a bit higher?
Time to hit the hay! G’night!
Updates & Upgrades
I worked a lot on ChristianFilmTrailers.com the past few days. I’ve been waiting for a long time for the Courageous Trailer to come out so I could get it on the site. We’d held the top spot for searches of the film which has brought in thousands and thousands of visits to the site, but now that the trailer is active it really was an opportunity to shine. The sites traffic doubled after the trailers release! I worked today to get some upgrades done on the site, and added a bunch of new films to the list. It doesn’t take very long to add more, but I just haven’t had the time. Technically I didn’t today but this site is getting too much traffic for me to leave it alone. We’ll see how the site grows as more and more films are added each month.
I met with Jerry Gillis today who is the head pastor at The Chapel at Crosspoint, the church Denise and I currently attend. Denise grew up in that church and we began attending there together after we got married. I had moved to East Amherst which made my home church a bit of a drive, and it was time to move on. I had setup the meeting a little over a month ago with Jerry to discuss some things pertaining to filmmaking (oddly enough). He was incredibly chill and mellow which was nice to see compared to the preaching on Sunday. I’ll be honest in a church of that size (a couple thousand at their main campus on sunday) you really don’t feel like you can know your main Pastor and even if you try to say hello most of the time they’re very busy or you feel like you have 8 seconds to cram in whatever you want to say. Not what I’m used to after growing up in a church of about 200-250. It was refreshing to just sit down without interruption and speak with Jerry one on one.
Not until after I setup the appointment did God really bring forth the kind of story that’s developing for movie number two, or the whole moving thing, so I had different things to talk about then I originally thought. The film deals a bit with church politics and what goes on behind the scenes so I was speaking to him about his difficulties in his job, how that effects the home, his background, etc. It was nice to hear some personal things and gather some ideas from him. We also spoke of Atlanta because that’s where the likely move is, and Jerry is from there. We spoke of the city and the advantages / disadvantages of going there, and the adv / disadv of staying here in Buffalo. It’s really hard to juggle these things at the moment. I love the area here, we have beautiful and mild summers, a fall season nobody else in the country gets, nobody shoots up here so it might actually act as a great advantage to accessibility, but the advantages are obvious as well. What I’m trying to do is not think about the career related elements and focus on the family. My parents are going to be in the south on a more official basis, and I want any future kids near them (and I want to be near them too). I want to make movies wherever I live, that’s a given, and while there would be lots of reasons to stay here, Atlanta is what me and Jerry both agreed to be “a wealth of resources.” Business friendly, amazing travel hub (busiest airport since 1982…in the WORLD), and it’s sorta the Hollywood of the East-Coast with a ton of film activity there every year and increasing all the time. Buffalo would be the complete opposite, with no resources what so ever of equipment or people (at least not much). Still, family really has to come first. I moved a lot in the last few years so I don’t want to go making another mistake. Wherever we end up going is where I’ll end up making this second film, and I feel like if I move down south there’s no way I’ll want to come back.
Most friends that are here are leaving in less than a year, with all of them pursuing seminary almost. Very little would be left here for Denise and I (at least what we have now). I’ve said before I’m not entirely sure I want to raise my family here either so that makes the decision a bit easier. It’ll be tough to leave, but the move might be necessary no matter what. Granted the ease of the move could fall apart tomorrow, we don’t know. We’ll have the opportunity to go down there to a house with 4 bedrooms, 2 car garage, etc. for a decent rent, newly redone, etc. with no strings attached, first dibs, and it’s owned by her sister, so that helps. But if they can’t get into their new house they’re looking at, it all falls through. Doesn’t mean we can’t move, but having that house with the possibility to stay there for a bit until we figure out where we’d want to settle is a big plus. We’d be in Snellville, GA about 45 mins from downtown Atlanta. It’s all a lot to think about and pray about. Plenty of time to see what changes or what happens. But of course me as the dude I’m running all of it through my head 1000 times a day trying to find a comfortable answer for myself. I really want to find where I can settle ASAP LOL…I’m impatient so it’s a tough place for me to be. I need to be trusting the Lord right now and patient. It’s crazy that I’m going to be 23 this June yet already thinking about that house I die in and raise my family in with the hopes of staying in it. A bit premature perhaps but as Jerry told me today “You’re ahead in life.” LOL. I get that a lot lately…
Prayers appreciated for all these things, and for the story we’re working on to slowly come together. The more I tell certain folks about it the more certain I am that this story has something to it and that it’ll be something good. I think it has the guts of a good story it just needs to properly crafted and layered. I’m so sick of some of the things being put into the market I work in. I won’t even touch a camera unless I’m very confident in my script, no way. There’s too much garbage flooding into this market every month for me to add to it. Everyone is spending large amounts on dumpy films, or spending very little on dumpy films. It seems like budget isn’t even making a difference anymore! Poor stories, poor presentation, poor camera work, poor acting, poor DVD covers, poor websites, poor marketing, etc. It’s all over the place and the market is getting more crowded by it. By God’s Grace I won’t be apart of the problem. We need good stories in this market, not just another end-times movie repackaged into something else, or another sappy laden film with poor theology and lazy dialog. It’s gotta stop…
NOTE: My goal there was not to sound prideful or like I’m some sort of genius. I make my own mistakes, and there are a lot of beginners out there making their first films too. STANDING FIRM wasn’t perfect either…FAR FROM IT. Just frustrated with those I know about who can do better. I know it, they know it, but to make a quick buck they never improve. Yes, there’s people like that in the Christian market…and it’s unfortunate. So don’t let this post be a discouragement, I hope it pumps you up to do better at what you’re doing to the best of your ability!!
I’ve been handed two more DVD Covers to do in the next month or so, and I’m starting some marketing for another film tomorrow. Work is very steady right now! Time for bed folks…night!
