It’s a great feeling when you’re struck with a very distinct vision for a project right from the get-go. When you can see all of the elements in one clean sweep, like the instructions have just been handed to you and all you have to do now is follow them.
It can feel special when this happens, and the obsession to get the project made can be really overwhelming, can completely consume you as you put all your efforts into getting it done. It’s like some sort of blessing from the muse.
The problem that usually arises, at least for me, is that I likely don’t have the abilities, skills, or tools that are going to be required to get some, or all, of the elements complete. And when I realize this, the whole thing can crumble.
A few weeks ago I was rereading some of my old notebooks and I came across a poem that I’d written and just tossed to the side. Rereading it, I rather liked it, and wondered if I could perhaps do something with it.
Later that day I was surfing through some old pictures I’d taken and I found a series of photos that I’d taken in an old fort. I thought they were very cool, and I once again wondered if I could do something with them.
Bam! Eureka! Zing!
The idea had sparked. I’d put the poem to the photos and create a sort of video collage. I liked it, and I thought of what I believed was a great way on how to incorporate the lyrics as subtitles.
Rather than simply type the lyrics onto the images, I’d superimpose scraps of paper that had hand-written lyrics on them. This would enable a certain element of collage and texture that I thought was very important to the piece.
I spent a good amount of time perfecting these little scraps. Making sure the lettering was how I wanted it, that the paper was of the right quality, and that the way each piece was torn would have the right amount of texture to it.
This is where the problem presented itself.
I had no idea how to transfer these pieces onto my computer while also keeping the texture and clarity that I had painstakingly worked on.
I tried various types of scanning – my phone and printer – I tried using Adobe Illustrator to precisely crop out each scrap of paper, I tried simply taking a photo. Nothing looked as good as it did in real life, and I had no idea how to move forward.
I’m sure there is a way to do this, to get it exactly how I wanted it, but I’m an amateur. I’m learning lots of things, and this evidently was not one of things I could learn to do just yet. I’m sure it’s easy, but my skills just aren’t there.
I really almost threw away the whole project. It was very close. The vision was compromised, I was pissed off at my computer and at myself, and things just didn’t seem to be working the way I wanted them to.
But I didn’t. I just made the lyrics regular subtitles and moved forward.
After I finished the project and gave myself a pat on the back, I wrote “If you want something but it’s not working… move on” on a post-it note and stuck it above my desk.
If you’d like to see the finished film, you can watch it here.
Looking back, I can think of a lot of projects that I never finished because some detail, that was apparently critical to the vision, just wasn’t working.
It seems that no detail is worth that much that an entire project should hinge on its inclusion.
If you want something but it’s not working… move on.