Work has been uncomfortably slow the past couple months. My savings account is hemorrhaging, so I’m not going out very often or doing any of the varied, exciting things I normally do. Most days lately I’ve spent at home working on personal projects and trying to find new clients. It’s been pretty dull and disheartening honestly. For me, this only increases the volume of my daily question, “What am I going to film today?”
I have three guiding principles for my One Second Films: Each scene has to be from my perspective, it has to be descriptive of the day, and it has to be honest. Those are all pretty easy to achieve on a day spent at an amusement park, but what about the days when nothing extraordinary happens? Or when the most poignant moment of the day was painful or embarrassing? Do I show that? If so, how?
Many times over the years I’ve wrestled with capturing and conveying the unglamorous days. For example: How do I show anger when I can’t film myself? How do I portray the weight of sadness? What about exhaustion, insight, sex, loneliness, or frustration? Filming something on those days is never easy nor obvious, but to hide those parts of my story would be dishonest.
When I asked myself recently, “What is this day about? What am I doing today?” the honest answer came back immediately: Today feels like I’m wasting money. And suddenly I knew exactly what I needed to film:
Filming it was easy enough. The hardest part for me is sharing it. Not only do I feel vulnerable talking about my finances, but the scene is both irrational and illegal. Is that something I want on the internet? I don’t know. However, it communicates exactly what I intended.
So I wonder, at what cost am I willing to make and share my art? Should I be concerned about what might happen when I click publish? Focusing on the consequences is surely the best way to never do anything consequential.
On the other hand if I felt comfortable and nonchalant about sharing it, would I be creating art that really matters to me? I think there’s always some struggle involved in meaningful work, but this, to me, feels like I’m teetering on the edge of danger. Maybe this is how others artists often feel, but it’s quite new to me.
Deep down I feel like I need to share this. Maybe I’ll regret it, but at very least it feels like a fantastic mistake.