Updates and reflections on my personal creative projects and life.
Becky and I had a wonderful week in Montana visiting my parents
My parents had been wanting me to visit their home in Ennis, Montana for a bit now since they moved out there, but I wasn’t able to due to the pandemic. Well, fully vaccinated and feeling comfortable with flying, Becky and I made it out to Montana and spent a week with them. We had a great vacation where we hiked a bunch, relaxed and read, and explored Bozeman.
I’ve been spending a lot of time working on my comics and volunteering at the IPRC, a local Portland non-profit dedicated to making DIY printing accessible to folks. I wrote about it at the Big Cartel blog!
Looking back on how 2017 went, and what I want to accomplish in 2018.
A year is a nice amount of time. It’s long enough to accomplish significant things in one’s life, but it’s not too long as to forget the details of it all. I believe there’s value in reflecting on a project or period of time to see what worked, what didn’t, and what can be done better the next time around.
The video I made and my favorite photos from my brother’s wedding in Maine in August 2017.
This past weekend my older brother got married on the coast of Maine. I took some photos and shot some video (which I edited together above). It was a beautiful weekend. It’s a rare and special thing for so much family and friends to come together.
Here are my favorite photos from the weekend:
Reflections on what I learned making my first short film.
In the week since I finished my first short film, Hanging in There, I’ve been reflecting on the project and what I’ve learned.
A short film about a young man who finds himself unable to leave his apartment, but he’s hanging in there.
Presenting Hanging in There, my first short film.
For the first time in my life, I felt like what I was doing was the right thing.
A teaser trailer for the short film I’ve been working on, Hanging in There, with music by Gahlord Dewald.
It should be completed by the end of July.
Details on my upcoming first short film.
I’ve been working on a short film titled Hanging in There. It’s my first fictional video project, so it’s a bit of an experiment. I began writing the script and planning the project in May, and I started shooting today.
Dylan, the main character, is unable to leave his apartment. But he’s getting by.
Hanging in There is all about restraints. I’m the only actor, and it takes place entirely within an apartment. Not having to deal with casting and locations seemed like a nice way to get familiar with the process of planning, shooting, and editing a short film.
I still have a handful of scenes left to shoot, but so far, so good. I’m aiming to have Hanging in There finished by the end of July.
David Lynch’s films made me fall in love with cinema. Haruki Murakami’s novels made me fall in love with literature.
Why I moved my journal from Jekyll to Wordpress.
I decided to give my journal a little refresh by migrating it from my main website, which is built in Jekyll, to WordPress. It feels a bit like returning home, as I initially started blogging on WordPress over 10 years ago when I was in high school. WordPress is still just as pleasant to use now as it was then.
Jekyll felt a bit limiting in that it doesn’t have search, there are aren’t built in category and tag pages, and there isn’t a simple way to author posts from my phone and iPad. Plus WordPress has built in comments, which is nice. (Disqus’s ads are offputting to me.)
My main website will essentially just be a directory of my completed projects, as well as an archive of what I’ve written there over the years. This new journal should make it easier to write posts, which should lead to new posts more often.
Brett Chalupa's Journal 