365 Days Around The Sun

“Tally”

There is a lot when I lay horizontal in bed and question life.  Is there something I did, right?  Or something I did just to get by with? What does that say about me?

The pawn shops. Some of you will get will this blog the other half maybe not so much.  Half.  You will by the end.

The treasures you once had owned are traded to a shady person at a shady place and it (your item) is no longer yours.  Fifty percent, if you are lucky the money is yours.  The other half and your passion/possession is GONE…gone and gone forever. Less than half of what you paid (or your dad’s golden cross) in the beginning. YES, I Pawned IT, my dad’s cross. I still hate myself to this day for doing that so much! It is just like you understand one another’s professions and others do not.  Did that material artifact matter? It did to the person that owned it.

Do you know me  or how of a quadriplegic  I  am becoming ? The pawn shop does not and does not care.

Everything has a story the one you just pawned.  A bill to pay or something else.  It indicates your story (life) of what you tell and feel at the time.

My story is a red light and a video camera that is in record mode, referred to as the Tally Light. Aren’t we all in record mode?  From the simple “hello” to coworkers/ passerby’s or others that work to repair homes not of their own but of someone else’s etc. You may not know it at the time, but the record button was and has been pushed. Hit record as though you want others you to see you down the road.

Now a days the cameras I use, you can actually turn it (tally) off or on to not distract the person in front of the lens. Most people being interviewed forget about it after a short while, so if the person behind the camera is kind and understanding of the nature of the Q&A. They turn it off.

Some gravitate to it, although they may not admit it as is a (tally) has made them a lot of money. What if there was no red light for your favorite sporting event/team, regardless of what it is?  Think those players would get paid the obscene amount of money they do get? Or how about the “celebrities” I use that term loosely because I can NOT stand them or their obsession about what is good for me and the environment, as they fly around on private jets across the globe.  I honestly do not like actors…I guess they really are ‘actors!’  If you have nothing good to say, then go away regardless if is in front of the lens. I’ve never been in the movie industry so I do not know if the lens that films them have a red light, but I would presume they have some apparatus to say they are in ‘record’ mode.

I had two ‘superiors’ in two different jobs tell me, “All you do is push a button, and a camera is a camera.”

And while they are correct ‘All I do is push a button.’  But what goes into that button?  Pre-planning, setup lights, does anyone reading this know what a KEY LIGHT is?  Or what a HAIR LIGHT is? And angles as well.

But I guess everyone has become videographers now, as their ‘smartphone’ can make videos. They can, but are they thought out and prepared for?  T.T. has diminished my roll and while I can feel sad for my profession, I do realize we are ALL replaceable.

I have never been more disappointed when someone questioned me and my 30-years of expertise.  Granted I learned it (the specialty) every day down the road.  But to claim I just hit a button makes me feel like shit.  I want to say, “Go hire someone else,” and see the outcome.  It is an art, or at least it was.  But DO NOT dismiss my specialty and you dismiss my advice and history and ME!

Do you think I want to make something worse?  HELL no, but I am tired of those telling me, “Yesterday I misunderstood you; we are going in a new direction.”  For the production and we are going to do it this way. Should I remind you that I am not trying to sabotage the shoot, I am giving 110% to see it succeed and not fail YOU, but you have failed me. We just do not hit a button, just like we do not in life.  It is calculated and it is important, it is my profession, and I hope I never get another email that says, “We misunderstood.”  Do NOT be discounted.  Your performances on this world matter regardless as if you hit a button or any professional job  you worked in or anything else you do.  You should be appreciated for your talents and do not stop growing wether it be a red light  or something you lost to a shady place.

I guess we are all a fraction  of what we thought  we were! Even if we and our expertise are sold at a pawn shop…….Disappointing. Half or maybe less than half.