The upcoming BikerCHEF show is really not just a cooking and travel show, it is a state of mind where there is room at the table for everyone...just like this little Italian lad who made me smile with his "ciao."

Chris Northrop. Digital artist, cartoonist, and new media marketeer.

Mr. Northrop is from Brooklyn, NYC and has been drawing since he could hold a pencil. This young man is an entirely self taught artist and is not afraid of the brave new digital world. He's worked for Nickelodeon as an digital animator, Atom films as a flash animator, and doing MGM marketing for their Sci-Fi channel show Stargate Atlantis.



In Febuary his animated series "Just Daves" premeires on Superdeluxe.com. Written by Jacob Holmes and Aaron Berman. Superdeluxe is a comedy website owned by Adult Swim (Cartoon Network's late night programming block.) They ordered 3 episodes with the option open to order more. He serves as animation director. We are all very proud of him at EARSXXI.




I brought Mr. Northrop on the EARSXXI team for his self taught, digital expertise and the fact that my son likes his comics. He will be producing and running our upcoming CRCNEM project--a neverending movie concept in which all of us are directors/filmmakers around the real and cyber globe. So stay tuned for that. You will able to access it early next year at www.christophercoppola.com.

For more info on Chris Northrop go to his home page

DigiV and DigiP in the zone. (collage by Chachi)

Internet tutorials for filmmakers:

Digital filmmaking is becoming so affordable that almost anyone can make a film. The price of equipment is coming down as well as the software you use to create your finished piece. If you are a novice and don't feel that comfortable using Final Cut or Adobe Premier there are resources available on the web. Many filmmakers like to show off their skills on the Internet and you can find tutorials for pretty much anything you want to achieve, whether it is keying out green screen or creating monsters in After Effects. A great resource is lynda.com, this site has a membership fee however, but with your membership you get clips to work with so that you can follow along. If you don't want to pay for tutorials there are several free sites, such as video copilot, or just ask uncle Google what you are looking for. Happy filmmaking.

There is always some kid who may be seeing me for the first time. I owe him my best.
--Joe DiMaggio

A very happy Thanksgiving to everyone. i am grateful for all my off-line and on-line EARS/PAH/PlasterCITY family and friends who have stuck by me. Thank you very much.

Here's some Thanksgiving Wisdom:

We can only be said to be alive in those moments when our hearts are conscious of our treasures.
--Thornton Wilder

With the help of my friend and PAH colleague Suzanne Boyd, I had the pleasure of meeting and presenting Mr. Elmore Leonard at PAH-FEST:Motown 2007. The master writer was a phenomenally giving man; he humbly and unconditionally shared his creative process and expertise with all of us, no strings attached. I remember my father telling me this about the great composer and pianist Franz Lizst, how he too would give his vast talent and knowledge freely to any pupil, rich or poor, who wanted to learn from him in the hopes they would one day do the same. These are examples of the powerful lineage of the CREATIVE PROCESS, creative sparks being passed down from master to pupil, one generation to another generation, old school to new school, one human to another human...a nobility to be respected and cherished...and, most of all, for all of humanity, in one way or another, to share in. It is the sacred part of the Human Spirit.

I am not really presenting, but recommending Mr. Leonard's 10 Rules of Writing. The master's rules are direct, clear and accessible...perfect building blocks for anyone to use.

Elmore Leonard's 10 Rules of Writing:
(his explanations below are just a taste, you have to get his book to receive the full learning experience)

1. Never open a book with weather. If it's only to create atmosphere, and not a character's reaction to the weather, you don't want to go on too long. The reader is apt to leaf ahead looking for people. There are exceptions. If you happen to be Barry Lopez, who has more ways to describe ice and snow than an Eskimo, you can do all the weather reporting you want.

2. Avoid prologues.

They can be annoying, especially a prologue following an introduction that comes after a foreword. But these are ordinarily found in nonfiction. A prologue in a novel is backstory, and you can drop it in anywhere you want.

3. Never use a verb other than "said" to carry dialogue.

The line of dialogue belongs to the character; the verb is the writer sticking his nose in. But said is far less intrusive than grumbled, gasped, cautioned, lied. I once noticed Mary McCarthy ending a line of dialogue with "she asseverated," and had to stop reading to get the dictionary.

4. Never use an adverb to modify the verb "said" . . .

. . . he admonished gravely. To use an adverb this way (or almost any way) is a mortal sin. The writer is now exposing himself in earnest, using a word that distracts and can interrupt the rhythm of the exchange. I have a character in one of my books tell how she used to write historical romances "full of rape and adverbs."

5. Keep your exclamation points under control.

You are allowed no more than two or three per 100,000 words of prose. If you have the knack of playing with exclaimers the way Tom Wolfe does, you can throw them in by the handful.

6. Never use the words "suddenly" or "all hell broke loose."

This rule doesn't require an explanation. I have noticed that writers who use "suddenly" tend to exercise less control in the application of exclamation points.

7. Use regional dialect, patois, sparingly.

Once you start spelling words in dialogue phonetically and loading the page with apostrophes, you won"t be able to stop. Notice the way Annie Proulx captures the flavor of Wyoming voices in her book of short stories "Close Range."

8. Avoid detailed descriptions of characters.

Which Steinbeck covered. In Ernest Hemingway's "Hills Like White Elephants" what do the "American and the girl with him" look like? "She had taken off her hat and put it on the table." That's the only reference to a physical description in the story, and yet we see the couple and know them by their tones of voice, with not one adverb in sight.

9. Don't go into great detail describing places and things.

Unless you're Margaret Atwood and can paint scenes with language or write landscapes in the style of Jim Harrison. But even if you're good at it, you don't want descriptions that bring the action, the flow of the story, to a standstill.

And finally:

10. Try to leave out the part that readers tend to skip.

A rule that came to mind in 1983. Think of what you skip reading a novel: thick paragraphs of prose you can see have too many words in them. What the writer is doing, he's writing, perpetrating hooptedoodle, perhaps taking another shot at the weather, or has gone into the character's head, and the reader either knows what the guy's thinking or doesn't care. I'll bet you don't skip dialogue.

My most important rule is one that sums up the 10.

If it sounds like writing, I rewrite it.

For more info on and to buy Mr. Leonard's 10 Rules of Writing book go to the Elmore Leonard webpage.

NFP and CRC took a trip to REELZ Channel today to pitch a promotional PAH TV idea--this is not America's Funniest Videos, but rather a show that shares meaningful digital short stories by the people for the people with me as the DigiVangelist hosting. It would be a chance to get the PAH NATION message out to a broader audience and give an additional venue for PAH FEST participants. There would also be a DigiVangelist/DigiPostle component in which we demonstrate how some new digital gizmo can be used to hone one's unique voice as a visual storyteller. They liked the concept, now let's see if we can set it up.

I have talked with many colleagues about the youth today and how one feels they have to watch their backs in business and in life if they are to survive. One of the reasons why my uncle got tired of making Hollywood films was because he would constantly have to deal with and outsmart the so called 25-30 year old business school producers, so he made a fortune in entirely different businesses and now makes the personal films he wants. The 2007 Dodgers baseball team fell apart because of talented kids fighting with proven veterans which really bummed me and my son out. Other parents ask me if I recognize the kids today, even my own kid. This saddens me. I do feel there is a disconnect between generations, but I believe that happens when great civilizations start to decay. Greed takes over, us against them logic rules and simple acts of kindness tend to be few and far between. It's as if our youth has a sense of entitlement because they have a sense that there is very little time left. I don't believe this is our kids' fault...they are a product of us and older generations and it is very important that we let them find themselves in these complex times and to do our best to guide them back to our collective humanity...and, most of all, to love them regardless. Besides, everything moves in circles.

Does the below sound familiar?

The children now love luxury. They have bad manners, contempt for authority, they show disrespect to their elders.... They no longer rise when elders enter the room. They contradict their parents, chatter before company, gobble up dainties at the table, cross their legs, and are tyrants over their teachers.

-- Socrates

The highest and most beautiful things in life are not to be heard about, nor read about, nor seen but, if one will, are to be lived.
--Soren Kierkegaard

When I was a kid my little brother and I would often stay with our Italian grandparents for part of the summer. They had a swimming pool and a festive patio with glowing colored lanterns. Mammarella would make us her deep fried calzones for lunch after we had a swim. I remember the taste very well... a perfectly salted, olive oil, smokey ham, juicy melted ricotta/mozzarella essence of southern Italian bliss under the sun. During my recent trip to Italy, a little lunch shop on an island in the middle of Lake Maggiore successfully brought me back to that wonderful Mammarellian memory.

Not that it really matters, but I didn't say PAH was the only festival in which movies were made during the week. The Duke City Shootout (which I was involved with in the very beginning and helped in many ways) was the first festival to do that and still does. I did say PAH is the only global, digital empowerment, new media festival not concerned with Hollywood screenplays or finding the next "Spielberg", but rather celebrating the creative process by helping everyday people share their stories in an accessible, professional manner to the rest of the world. And, we let some of the Hollywood glamour shine on everybody in the process. I just want to set the record straight.

PAH IN THE NEWS

Thank you very much to the REELZ CHANNEL for this nice spot on PAH.

APPLE PHOTO BOOTH FUN--I'M ALL EARS AND CHINS.

iPod touch:

The newest in the iPod family is the iPod touch and it is exactly that, it has a touch screen just like the iPhone. It works like any other iPod, you can store your music, videos, and photos, but now you can also surf the web. This feature makes up for the disappointing features of the new iPod. In true Apple fashion, the first generation of this iPod limits you to 16 GB of space while the classic iPod is up to 160 GB and the touch will set you back $400. If you have to have the latest iPod and you don't mind the price it is a great product. It has some great applications that you might already be familiar with such as safari, iTunes, iCal, contacts, and even youTube. You can sync your home computers calendar, contacts, and your web bookmarks right to the iPod. The one missing application that they should have included is Mail. You can access your mail but you have to go through your various mail servers instead of using one application. In a few generations of this iPod touch you won't need to haul around your laptop anymore everything will be contained in your iPod. Right now you can get either an 8 GB or a 16 GB iPod touch for $299 or $399, in the future I don't think the price will drop but the Gigabytes will increase. Overall 4 out of 5 stars, and unless you really need one, I would wait until it can hold more.

There is not one good man on earth who does what is best and does not err.

-- Ecclesiastes

a memory of Robert Goulet. He was a consummate "old school" professional and a complete gentleman. I looked forward to his scenes because he brought a breath of fresh air to a rather difficult production. He was always gracious to me and even flirted a bit with my grandmother when she visited the set. I am honored to have had the priviledge to work with the man.

Apple Photo Booth Fun.

A Look at Leopard:

The new operating system Leopard has been out for a week and it has some amazing new features. The overall esthetic of Leopard is quite beautiful and the ergonomics of the workflow is awesome. One of the best features for EARS XXI is the new iChat theater. Ears has two offices, one in Los Angeles and one in Albuquerque, with this new feature we can stay in contact with each other easily and efficiently. In the new iChat not only can you see the person you are talking with, you can also view documents together, whether it is word documents, presentations, or even video. Another great aspect of this is that if the two offices are working on a presentation or a video project together instead of emailing back and forth changes, each office can access the others desktop to make changes to the project. Most times being in the same physical space with your co-workers makes the most sense, but if you can't, the next best thing is being in the same physical cyberspace.

Well- you can have me all the time
Or you can never come my way
But Mother Earth is waiting for you
There's a debt you've got to pay
I don't care how rich you are
I don't care what you earn
You know that when it all comes down
You've got to go back to Mother Earth

You know you may have a million dollars
Or you may drive a cadillac
You may have enough money
To buy anything, ANYTHING you lack
Well- I don't care how rich you are
I don't care what you're worth
Cuz you know when it all comes down
You've got to go back
You've got to go back to
Mother Earth

--L. C. Frazier