Submitting to Festivals, Award Winning Jam and the Next Project

After finishing my film about Hooper, I didn’t really know what to do next. I had just finished this project that took a lot of my time and energy and now it’s done. It’s a bit of a letdown to be honest. I’m sure I’m not the only who feels that way after they finish something they put a lot of energy into. So the question is, what now?

What’s next for Becoming Parents?

When I thought about what I wanted after finishing this project, I thought back to film school when one of my favorite professors introduced us to withoutabox.com (which isn’t around anymore) and encouraged us to create an account so we could submit our films to festivals. I did some searching and came across www.filmfreeway.com.com. I created a page for Becoming Parents and decided to shoot my shot with it. What do I have to lose?

I remember going back and forth on this project and feeling creatively stuck and my husband says to me, “just make the thing. It doesn’t even have to be good.” And that really has stuck with me. It takes a lot of the pressure off and I really needed to hear that in order to keep going. I think part of this creative process too besides making the thing, is sharing the thing.

So far, I’ve submitted to 14 festivals - I don’t have all the money in the world to submit this to everything so I really searched for free or low cost entrees. And look almost every day to see if any new ones pop up. I will keep you posted on how things progress. I hope to continue to put this film out there and market it as much as I am able all while figuring out the next thing. Note to anyone submitting through there - I highly recommend becoming a gold member! It’ll save you on the entry fees.

Now, what’s the next film project?

I want to switch gears here with the next thing and just flip the script. I am working on a very short stop motion video for Halloween. It’s a method that I’ve always been interested in and it’s a different mindset from the doc style video. Can’t wait to share it!

Second place jam at the Manheim Farm Show

Also! I just entered my strawberry-raspberry jam into our local farm show (Manheim Farm Show) for the first time ever and I got second place! My mom has been canning fruits, jams, jellies, you name it ever since I can remember. She used to do that with my grandmother and now it’s something we do together. She encouraged me to enter and I thank her for that. You just never know what’s going to happen so give yourself the opportunity to win. Don’t be the one to say no to yourself. That’s what I’m learning here. And I hope I can spread a little bit of that to other people and encourage them as well.

Until next time, keep creating and keep SHARING!

Dana

P.S. Currently watching/current favorite: Fear

I made my short film!

Hello!

It’s been a few weeks since I posted last - I’ve been trying to focus on what started this in the first place which is my short film about my son, Hooper! And it’s finally finished! I am so happy to share with you my film, Becoming Parents.

Becoming Parents short film

This film exploring what it means to become a parent - told by me and my husband, Brandon about our son - Hooper. 

Bringing a child into the world is a really scary, amazing thing and I wanted my husband and I to take a few minutes to reflect on how it has changed our lives. The joy, the realness of it all, there are so many things you feel when you become a parent that I wasn’t expecting and this explores that.

This project let us explore our parenthood journey more in depth and allowed us to record it so eventually Hooper can listen to it himself (if he wants to). 

I am so happy to finally share this. Though I am always nervous to share things that are close to me, I know I need to do more of that for myself so here we are. I made this for my family so we always have a little joy to come back to when things get difficult. I also made this for me. It was time for me to explore creative projects outside of work and push myself to put something out there. Thank you to everyone who has cheered me on. This has meant so much to me and I’m so excited for what’s to come.

I plan to keep creating and keep posting about the journey, so stay tuned for what’s next.

What am I watching?

Emily in Paris - the pageantry, the love triangles. It’s all ridiculous and I love it! And it also makes me angry. Too many throwaway plot points. Anyone else feel this way?

Until next time! Keep watching and keep creating out there!

Dana

Credits-
Becoming Parents
A short film by Dana Wiker
Shot & Directed by Dana Wiker
Produced by Dana Wiker and Brandon Cardenas
Starring Hooper, Brandon Cardenas and Dana Wiker
Music by: Yehezkel Raz - Flight of the Inner Bird - Instrumental Version - via Artlist.io

Where does inspiration come from?

Third blog in a row! Let’s keep it going.

So far I’ve got about 40 minutes of footage which probably isn’t enough for what I want to do. But I’m also struggling with the idea of how to put this video together. I keep hoping that what I shoot will inspire a storyline and it hasn’t so far. I probably have more than 40 minutes but that’s referring to horizontal. I don’t know why I hesitate to include vertical shots. I’m just not sure how to do that in an aesthetically pleasing way. Any thoughts?

What do you do when inspiration/motivation is lacking?

With a creative wall that I’ve hit right now, I need to remind myself that one idea can spark another. And just to keep going and make the thing even if it’s not good. KEEP CREATING! Who knows what that can lead to. I’m going to keep shooting and keep up with the editing. Hoping to share something next week. Stay tuned!

Some unexpected places I’m finding inspiration this week:

Coloring! We love to color in our house so we’ve been drawing/coloring everything from Sesame Street characters to tracing Hooper’s hand. Baking is another way I like to be creative. I made this Sunken Berry Almond Cake from King Arthur; definitely recommend. And flowers. Hooper picked out these white and blue flowers at the grocery store.

What are you watching?

We just finished watching the third season of The Bear on Hulu! I can never get enough of The Bear. Fantastic cast, acting, directing, everything. Favorite episodes of this season include: 1) Napkins - Tina’s backstory of how she came to work at The Beef/Bear. 2) Ice Chips: Jamie Lee Curtis and Abby Elliott’s acting in this is so intense and real - it reminded me so much of being in labor and what a scary, but exciting time that was. The acting on this show is just amazing.

Up next: there’s a new season of Unsolved Mysteries on Netflix!

Thank you!

As always, I appreciate anyone that takes the time to read this. I don’t know what I am doing, but maybe doing it anyway will help me figure it out.

Dana Makes a Movie Part II: Shooting Videos with Toddlers

Today’s blog is about shooting video with a loose idea and the struggles I face when it comes to the subject matter, my toddler. Do you face any of these challenges? How do you work through it? I would love to know. Drop me a line in the comments.

Back to our regularly scheduled programming: Ready, Set, Action! (Sort of)

When it comes to recording a toddler, there are quite a few challenges that I am learning to deal with. Here are a few of them:

1. Distractions - As he gets older, he notices the phone more now and whenever I bring it out he wants to play with it or see himself (see below haha). This makes it difficult to capture him in the moment because it interrupts the recording. Work arounds? I think I can incorporate the footage of him interacting with me/the phone too. This is part of life with him and that should be part of the story.

2. “Mommy phone away” - Hooper is getting great at telling us what he wants now, which is fantastic but also he’s very demanding. He’s learning commands like “mommy sit” “daddy go away” or “mommy phone away”. I am mostly recording him on my phone because it’s the easiest way to get footage of him and I am able to pull it out and record when I need to. But I also don’t want to be the mom on her phone all the time so there’s a balance I’m trying to find with this. As much as I want to be recording all the time, if he wants the phone to go away, I am more than happy to do that for him to give him my full attention. Part of the parenting process is learning to be in the moment with him and that’s something I am working on. If it takes me months to get what I need, then so be it. As long as I keep going, that’s all that matters.

3. Having to be ready at a moments notice - this is why I use my phone. It’s hard to plan recording footage of a toddler. Sometimes all he wants to do is sit and read with me or have me play with him so when he does something that I think is cute and want to record it, I have to be super fast in the moment to capture it. All of this is happening on the fly and I’m trying my best to work with it and make it into something.

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Footage so Far

Right now I have a loose idea of what I’d like to use this footage for, but I can’t see the whole video yet. My next idea is to record my husband and I interviewing each other about Hooper and see if that might give me a direction. We’ll save that for next week!

For now, here’s some of the footage I have shot so far!

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What am I currently watching?

This week, I was out of town on a work trip and I got to see Twisters.

Overall, I thought Twisters was a fun summer movie, but it definitely missed the mark in a few places. They were using the Dorothy device in college with no explanation of where they got that from, Daisy’s mom is teased out and then revealed, which was disappointing. And where the hell is Brisket? If you’ve been following the Twisters press tour, you know that Glen Powell adopts the dog that he’s supposed to save in the movie. But we never see Brisket in the movie! So disappointing. And also no mention whatsoever of climate change. But besides those points, I thought it was entertaining.

That’s it for this week! Moving along with the video and still continuing to watch things in my spare time. Hope you all have a great week ahead. Thanks so much for everyone who has read this and sent a supporting message. It’s scary to put yourself out there, but we need to do more of it!

Keep going!!

Dana

Dana Makes a Movie Part I: Watch and Learn

I haven’t written a whole lot on this website in a long time and I think it’s time to start creating for myself. I get bogged down with either focusing on work projects or the fear of showing anything that I’ve made personally. I’m working to change that this year so I decided to document my process of making a movie just for me and my growth journey in the video/podcasting world.

I will start with an introduction. My name is Dana. I am 34. I have a wonderful husband, 2 year old son Hooper and our 13 year old chihuahua named Hesher. I’m trying to find ways to bring more creativity into my life because recently (or not so recently) I’ve been feeling stuck, feeling too scared to put anything out there, too busy, too tired, the list goes on. 

Photo by Lauren Newcomer

But in the last few months, my husband Brandon, has been encouraging me to seek out creative things more. I edit and produce a lot of videos for my job and he made the simple suggestion of me watching more things (videos, short films, films, docs, TV shows, inspiration is everywhere) and I was almost kicking myself because it’s a great idea and I didn’t know why I hadn’t thought of it. I think it’s always something that’s lingering in my head but I never put it together that way. So simple.

Sometimes it just helps to say your frustrations or what you want to do out loud and someone else can just put it together so perfectly for you. Anyway, that inspired me to start watching more. 

I didn’t know where to start so I googled short films by famous directors. I just wanted to share a few of my favorites so far:

1. Lick the Star - Sophia Coppolla - WOW what great short film. Tales as old as time with mean girls but I really liked the rawness and brutality of these girls. Growing up, I saw some of that with the popular girls at school and I can relate to wanting to fit in.

2. Two cars, one night - Taika Waititi - I thought this was a clever one. As I get older, I forget how hard it was to be a kid, to be waiting for your parents with nothing to do. Just kids killing time but showing their aspirations of where they will be when they’re older. Perfect encapsulation of childhood.

3. Interview project - David Lynch - I could do a whole blog just about these! What I really loved about Interview Project is the randomness to picking these people and that everyone has a story to tell no matter what other characteristics define them. I hope to do something like this one day. You never know who might have a story to share.

It’s not a huge time commitment, if you’re looking for something to watch all of these are on YouTube. Definitely worth a watch!

Next steps for me?

I’m going to continue to consume and absorb content that inspires me everyday (hopefully) and I’m going to film more.

I have started shooting footage of our daily lives and recording some audio talking about it with my husband. Maybe I can call it my own version of Interview Project? Just trying to shoot a little bit each day and see where it goes.

I’ll keep you updated as I have things shot and get ready for editing.

Thanks for reading!

Dana

ATOMIC x iHeartRadio Music Festival 2019

Please click the link to read the article I wrote for ATOMIC on their involvement in the iHeartRadio Music Festival 2019.

ATOMIC x GRAMMY Salute to Music Legends Article

Please click the link to read the piece I wrote for ATOMIC on the GRAMMY Salute to Music Legends.

Whipped Cream Swirls!

Hey everyone!

When you’re photographing a dessert, have you ever wanted to add that perfect swirl of whipped cream but didn’t know how to do that AND get it to stay in place for a long time?

I’ll let you in on a little secret…shaving cream. 

Shaving cream will be your best friend next time you need to photograph that perfect dessert. All you have to do is grab some Barbasol or whichever brand you prefer and squirt a large amount into a piping bag. Then add your star tip. Get a firm hold on that bag and squeeze in a circular motion around the top of the dessert. To get the nice tip at the top, you just need to press down lightly and come back up. Here are some examples of my swirled whipped cream!

Items being sold: glassware

Look at how the light hits the swirls so perfectly and shows dimension. These desserts stayed looking fresh for quite a while!

Images belong to webstaurant store, taken by me.

Photographing the "Perfect Pour"

It’s freezing motion in time. There’s something so soothing about seeing the perfect pour of a beer or a cocktail into a glass. Somehow it’s even more satisfying when you capture that moment yourself. Conveying a sense of motion can really help to elevate not only your photography, but your brand as well. 

Getting that perfect shot can be difficult, because it requires so many variables to come together at once; someone to pour your liquid, as well as someone behind the camera. With your lighting set and the camera focused, getting that perfect shot doesn’t always happen the first time. Having backup glasses and enough liquid to pour more than one drink goes a long way towards capturing that shot. 

Once you’re setup, count to three and shoot away while the model pours the drink. With the bitters bottle below, it took two or three tries to capture the pour correctly

Using the pour motion displayed below, the products functions were highlighted in order to help the products sell themselves. No matter what is being sold in an image, adding motion can greatly help to elevate your photography. 

Item being sold: measuring cup. Showed pour in motion to convey easy functionality. 

Item being sold: bitters bottle. Showed pour in motion to convey easy functionality.

Images belong to webstaurant store, taken by me.

Stop Motion Exercise

In the new year, I am trying to push myself to expand my filmmaking skills and try new things. One thing I did recently, was to attempt a stop motion video. Turns out, stop motion takes a really long time to shoot so I did a small few second short just to test it out. Here is that video!

Elk Lake 2016

Every summer, my family goes to stay at our lake house in Northeastern Pennsylvania. My mother grew up close by so we have been making trips up there since before I was born. This past summer, we decided to walk the property of my Grandparents' house and the link below will show some pictures taken on my Grandparents' property as well as the lake property. Enjoy!

Elk Lake