Introduce Yourself: Sign In Here First

Hello everyone, my name is Tony Esposito and I'm in the middle of a
midlife career change. Do to 2 back operations I had to end my career
as a master automobile tech. I have been taping weddings as a side
line and also produced some small corporate videos. When I had to
change careers, I decided to go to school and get into video
production full time. I'm currently working on a documentary on the
growth of Charlotte NC, and how it effects the quality of life. I'm
also editing some works that will be shown at The Museum of the New
South. I'm so glad I found this site and hope to learn from it and
interact with the members.

Tony Esposito

Welcome Ron, are you aware of that excellent documentary film 'Butte,
Montana' by Thomas Schadt?

Hey, Tony, welcome to The D-Word. Guess what, I do weddings, too.
Edit in-the-camera, feature-length docs of the wedding day. It's one
of the ways I stake my independence and make docs of my own choosing.
It actually got me out of shooting corporate videos -- it's more
satisfying and I make a lot more $$$$.

Hi Doug, it is a very interesting way to make money and support my
other interests. I like the fact that each wedding is an event and
anything can happen. You have to be on your toes and ready for
something to happen that wasn't expected.
I have always thought that taping weddings was making a small
documentary of an event in ones life. The way the families of the
bride and groom interact is always interesting. Did they approve of
the wedding or was this wedding taking place because the bride was
expecting a little something. Great stuff to tape.
Take care,
Tony Esposito

John D. sneaking back in after an all too long absence. You don't
want to know/hear the LP version of what's been going on in my real
life, but the Readers' Digest version has me switching jobs and
moving from Texas to North Carolina.

After year away from the technical side of things, I'll be back
teaching production classes again. With any luck I'll get to teach a
16mm class in the near future, otherwise it's Mini DV and the Media
100. All of which means I will once again be checking into D-Word on
a regular basis.

It's good to be back.

Good to have you back, John. It's been toooo long.

Yup. :-)

Well, let's see what happens if I start with saying 'hello' to
everybody...

I see. Everybody right now seems to be nobody...

... he says, giving less than a minute for a reply. This ain't a
chat room, Alberto. But hello back at ya.

Alberto this is more akin to a community bulletin board. You leave a
note and everyone wanders by when they have time. So check back in
when you have a moment and see what's up.

Hi y'all,finally checking into the D-word "BBS".
I make independent documentaries, "The Shvitz" about the
Russian baths and "My Friend Paul" about my childhood friend,
the bank robber. Recently I did a "work-for-hire", the show
Maternity Ward for the Learning Channel (now known as TLC).

Funding for my films comes from foundations and TV; "Paul" got
a good wallop from ITVS, who gave completion funding. Now
making a new film about the ideals and impact of the 1960's.

Cheers.
Jonathan Berman
jb@escape.com

Sounds like a candidate for D-word pro.

Hello everyone. I am a newbie doc producer in the process of editing
my very first doc, a very short topic on sailing windmills (a type of
small one-design racing boat). I am doing this in preparation for
doing a longer project on gay and lesbian parents. I am located in
Columbus, Ohio, where there is a great community called the Columbus
Film Consortium (http://www.thecfc.org).

Bintu: I have learned a ton from reading the following three books:

Michael Rabiger's _Directing the Documentary_

Allan Rosenthal's _Writing, Directing, and Producing
Documentary Films and Videos_

Paul Kriwaczek's _Documentary for the Small Screen_.

Nice to meecha, Newbie. Books are great but JUST DOING IT, like
you're doing with your short, is better. No substitute for
experience. Keep us posted on your progress.

Hi Everyone. I'm a producer/director in post production on three
one-hour docs right now. Two for Oxygen Network, and one
independent.

The independent is about a sex worker/photogrpher who breaks
into the art world with black and white photos of her male client's
genitalia. The film also examines her relationships with a
long-time client, her live-in boyfriend, and friends. I'm close to
having a rough-cut and am looking for completion funds.

So...male frontal nudity.... Where does this doc belong? HBO?
Showtime? Or is it just a festival film? Will ITVS even consider it
for public TV? Will POV broadcast male frontal nudity? I called
PBS in Virgina but they are not repsonding.

Any and all thoughts are appreciated.
this site is a great idea. wish I had found it before.

malka

Molly, I think you want to also post this in the private conference.

For those of you who are just visiting the public D-Word conference,
you might have noticed a bunch of new registrants to The D-Word
Community accidentally post their intros in the public conference. You
can generally tell by their level of experience. Nothing wrong with
that, just trying to explain if you're confused.

Greetings, all! I am a television producer and journalist writing a
story for Cable World magazine (a weekly trade) on documentaries on
cable. Would love to hear your experiences pitching cable nets, and
to get a feeling for which networks are great to work with, which
ones aren't, is it getting easier to find a home for your docs with
the proliferation of digital channels ... ? Any and all thoughts
welcome! cheers, Shirley Brady (sbrady@mediacentral.com)

Greetings back at ya, Shirley. This is to chock full of juicy
insider gossip and slander to make public ;-) I'll email you.

Hi, I am a recent university graduate in Russian and East European
Studies who would love to make a documentary film on current living
conditions in Russia and Russian culture. I recently returned from
living in St. Petersburg, Russia(and studying the language) for seven
and a half months so I have a lot of ideas. If you know anyone
involved currently in this type of project, planning one in the
future, or any other BBS's to point me to, I would greatly appreciate
the help. Thanks so much!
--Shelley S. McIntosh
ElenaSSM@yahoo.com

Shelley - there are books available that could help you make your own
documentary. The tools to do so are very inexpensive.

A proposal I submitted to a state public TV network/PBS affiliate for
a 1 hr. doc was just green-lighted. I had asked for a broadcast
committment and the capability to solicit funding under their 501(c)
(3) status, which I have been provided, and in addition, they have
offerred fund-seeking, production, and promotional support. This will
be my first doc. I have worked in TV Network production & operations
for 17 years and for about 3 years I have been running my own small
production company. I am looking to D-word for some overall mentoring
and budget-writing support (they have asked for greater detail on the
budget I submitted). I look forward to hearing from, as we say in
NJ, "yous". Thanks!

Hi Elliot, congratulations on that, and I'm sure this is your entry
key to our main community doors!

Hi there. I am glad to finally be joining this comunity. I am the
Creative Director of MediaRights.org, a community Web site,
helps media makers, educators, nonprofits, and activists use
documentaries to encourage action and inspire dialogue on
contemporary social issues. We have a database of over 2,000
social issue documentaries and a database of the 700,000
nonprofit organizations in the USA . Filmmakers can list their
film for free and we will link to their distributor, Web site and
email. We are about to launch an Outreach Toolkit (with AIVF)
which helps documentary filmmakers design, fund and
implement outreach campaigns or grassroots distribution. One
of my goals at MediaRights.org is to make sure that we are
serving the documentary community as best we can so I am
always interested in hearing what resources people feel is
laking online.

Just a little background - I was an independent documentary
filmmaker and I made a personal documentary "Before You Go:
A Daughter's Diary" and I worked as porducer and camera on
"90 MILES" - just click on my username to get more info.

Hi Nicole,

Welcome to the D-Word. Very impressive list of documentaries at
MediaRights.org, I'll add one or two soon.

This is actually the public conference, so make sure you join us in
LINK NOT IMPORTED and introduce yourself there.