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What's up, Creative Army? Another Sunday, another edition of Coffee & Content.  Let's kick it off. First up, as you know, most industry readers give a screenplay about 5-10 pages before deciding whether they want to soldier on and spend the next 90-120 minutes of their lives with your story.  So how can you assure your screenplay sings from Page 1?  TOMKAT content provides some insights and some examples to back 'em up in their Writing the Perfect Movie Opening video. Next, I've featured m...

The world's first album composed and produced entirety by artificial intelligence was released in August, pushing the term "music collaboration" to a whole new level. The AI, known as Amper, works in collaboration with a human artist. At least one human artist that isn't afraid to step into the technology is Taryn Southern, a YouTube singer and storyteller with close to 500,000 subscribers. Just drop onto her YouTube channel and you'll immediately get a taste of her brand of music. She even t...

It happened. You lost it. Your passion and motivation are gone. We've all been there. Whether you have writer's block or are in an acting slump, it seems hard to get through it. I've been there too and I want to share the lessons I've learned because of it. Creators create and when that fire withers away, it can be life changing and painful. For me, it was devastating and debilitating. I couldn't cope. It took me ten years to find my footing, after losing everything. I left a great University an...

Just wrapped your latest short film? We have the competition for you! Until December 7, up-and-coming creators in the U.S. can submit their original short films to the 5th edition of the AT&T Film Awards. The AT&T Film Awards Short Film Competition The AT&T Film Awards is accepting undiscovered short films of any genre – with awards for original shorts under 10 minutes, shorts shot on mobile, VR/AR/MR projects, Spanish language shorts, and shorts created by youth ages 13-18. Submissions...

The very best way to learn the art of directing is from those who have learned from the very best. David Rountree, an award-winning feature film director (108 Stitches, CUT!) stopped by the Stage 32 offices to share some sound advice. From sound to crew to how to scout locations, he's got the goods.   David Rountree is the President of Psyco Rock Productions and is a director, producer, screenwriter, and actor based in Los Angeles. He is listed in Hollywood Reporter and IMDb as a Top 10 Up-a...

Monday, August 20th, 2018 - I got home at 10pm last night. I woke up at 5am that morning not knowing how my day would turn out. It was a beautiful mid-August morning with the hot sweltering heat and humidity of the past couple months finally breaking with a perfect weather day. However, myself and 18 other actors and crew members wouldn't be outside to enjoy the gorgeous weather. We were inside an air-conditioned vacant office in Plainville, MA instead, attempting an impossible feat. From left...

Some of our guest bloggers and their blog posts come from the depths of our lounge threads. They pose a question or statement, and before long, our members are locked in a heated debate about the question. That happened with Cheryl Allen's post, Goin' Guerilla. Here's what she asked: The responses were hot and cold.Up and down.For and against. If you review the thread, as well as my thread looking for some of you who've shot guerilla, you'll see that the term guerilla is defined and u...

Greetings from sunny London.  It's been an inspiring last few days screening our 3rd Annual Short Film Program at the Raindance Film Festival and shining a light on the incredible filmmakers who won this year's competition.  More on that soon, but for now, let's get to the Coffee & Content. First up, last week's Goodfellas Script to Screen proved to be extremely popular, so I figured I'd double up this weekend with a look at Aaron Sorkin and David Fincher's work with The Social Network. Thin...

It wasn't that long ago that my writing partner and I got burned by a cinematographer. We didn't get burned bad, but it was enough to wake me up to the importance of release forms and contracts. If you were part of the lounge discussion a while back, it looked like this:   Dozens of you offered me sound advice, some of which we took after talking to a lawyer. The issue was resolved and we found an incredible DP who got the job done. My takeaway was simple: ALWAYS HAVE A SIGNED CONTRAC...

FADE IN. INT. RADIO STATION – DAY CHYRON: APRIL 6TH, 2018 A small gathering of radio personalities and sales people sit around a table enjoying pizza and tales of yesterday. They range from the sentimental (like helping lonely seniors during the holidays) to the absurd (like the time a DJ mispronounced the name Kuntz in front a mall filled with Black Friday Shoppers. ) A banner hangs saying “Good luck Keith.” Hugs are shared and Keith (30’s) has tears of joy with a smile of relief and hope...