REALITY ENDS HERE

Many creative-type folks hate the mundane tasks that go along with any project they work on. Because typically, those tasks include paperwork and minute details that have nothing to do with the completion of their "vision."

Except they do.

I remember several of my classmates at USC complaining about all the paperwork the school required from us in order to film. There seemed to be a lot of red tape at times, but I think that was the point - to get us ready for filmmaking in the real world. And the real world is all about the details and the red tape.

USC's film school had words that someone wrote in cement near its entrance - "Reality ends here!" I remember a teacher telling me that they felt it had a double-meaning: it was both the beginning and the end of creativity.

As filmmakers, we could use our imaginations to create any world we wish to see. And yet if we wanted to take that world we made back into reality, we needed to be prepared. And that preparation included lots and lots of paperwork.

I'm happy to say I learned this lesson pretty well. So when we made our film, I made sure to dot all the i's and cross all the t's (well, nearly all of them). Sure, it slows the creative process a bit, but it saves you a bunch of headaches later.

Why am I sharing this with you? Because I've been doing lots of paperwork over the past month and I just felt like giving myself a pat on the back for my preparations.

And what does all this paperwork mean? Stay tuned...