Sunday, October 30, 2011

Closing Out October

Hard to believe October is almost over and November will begin. It won't be long now until the Chicago area is the grips of winters nastiness, which from "expert" opinions is supposed to be another terrible one, similar to the last 3 years. I remain skeptical, seeing as how winter 2010-2011 broke the record for consecutive years with 50+ inches of snow here, it seems inconceivable that it would happen 2 years in a row but hey, records were made to be broken.

In other news I had to miss the NWSF this year which kinda bummed me out. I was all set to go but went to the dentist a few days prior to get one of my many teeth problems fixed and got slapped with a bill that was allot higher than expected, and there went all my trip funds. I suppose I still could have went, but it wouldn't have been the smart thing to do financially, plus many of the faces I wanted to see down there weren't going, so I decided to just save my resources for chasercon.

I have been aggressive in knocking out bills and debt, so I can move forward with life on a clean slate. Its been a challenge but it is my priority now. I don't make much money, but what I do make is being used to knock out my debt so that once the future rolls around I can be better off. Its tough, but I manage...

DVDs are moving off the shelf, not as fast as I was hoping though. Not sure why, but probably because I set my price at 19.99 while most other chasers are offering theirs between 10 and 15. Mine is jam packed with 4 years worth of my best stuff though and is pretty much wall to wall tornado and extreme weather. Not knocking other DVDs but if I had allot of filler content and stuff I find boring [like blizzards and forest fires and 7 minute long dashcam shots of me driving towards a shelf cloud] I would have charged less.

Another reason is probably the title, it wasn't meant to be taken serious which is probably why allot of seasoned weather enthusiasts are ignoring it. Most of my sales are coming from the general public and fans/supporters of mine as opposed to the typical members of the chase community minus the couple trades I have done. Thats fine though, I wanted to branch out in that harder to reach market so in that aspect its been a success. I have had a few people tell me mine is the first DVD they have ever purchased, so for that I feel special and extremely grateful!

There is still the CA 2011 DVD which is about to be released as well, and those typically sell well and are bought by all the usual suspects so if I can have a leg in each side of the market that is certainly a good thing.

One things for certain though, when compiling footage for a DVD it is definitely the best way to critique your own shooting style, and I will be making sure I do allot of things to improve my videography skills in 2012. Tripoding more is a must. Many times I didn't want to grab my tripod because I didn't want to miss filming the tornado for those few seconds. I have now realized its worth missing a few seconds to have the rest be professional and stabilized.

Although in 2012 I plan to be more aggressive in my distance to tornadoes by getting closer, which means lots of in vehicle shots. Perhaps a dashcam mount - but for some reason I tend not to like daschcam footage when I see it from others. A stabilized shot is good, but those just seem TOO stable [if that makes sense] to where it diminishes the true chaotic-ness of the situation. We'll see, the winter will be long and Ill have lots of time to consider the pros and cons of the things I want to do differently in 2012.

Speaking of conventions. I am supposed to speak at the Indiana Storm Chasers convention this Saturday. Working with the bums in my group has been an eye rolling experience as usual since they can't commit to anything. Perhaps devolving the group into just a DVD production is the way to go...but thats another issue for another time...and now the GFS is driving me crazy with fantasy runs showing a potential chase the day of the convention [of course] so we'll see what happens.

Thats all for now!