Youthful ambitions: I was gonna be famous!

When I was younger I wanted to make it in Hollywood! After I discovered my love for Star Wars, I discovered a love for film and I began to set my sights on becoming a famous movie director and producer. I was never the acting type (in my last attempt to audition for a school play, I was cast as a mouse in Cinderella, not one of the cool talking mice, one that scurried around and then turned into a horse), but everything "behind-the-scenes" seemed fascinating and magical. Sets, camera angles, special effects, shooting on-location, editing, it all dazzled me. I took my first video editing class in junior high, where we learned to edit on the tape-to-tape VHS editing machine. I LOVED that machine. I could spend hours and hours on it. Even seeing one now makes my heart flutter.

My first "movie" was Godzilla X-Files. Yeah, you read that right. We spliced together footage of ourselves, episodes of The X-Files, and old Godzilla movies, then re-dubbed it with our own dialogue. (nerd alert! nerd alert!). Later we made it longer and dubbed it into German for my high school German honors project (seriously NERD. ALERT.) and for some odd reason that's the only copy I have. It is fabulous. I'd share it with you, but YouTube is being a punk ass and not letting it upload because it "may have content that is owned or licensed by FOX". We also dubbed several episodes of Fushigi Yuugi into German. Yeah, that's anime. I don't even need to tell you how nerdy that was...

In college I graduated away from VHS tapes and moved on to iMovie and Final Cut Pro. I may have majored in Asian Studies, but I still had a love for film. Now I work at a college IT department and as part of my job I get to teach students how to make videos for their classes (including for German class! How life comes full circle!). It's super fun.

I wish I had time to make more of my own productions. I did make a series of videos for the hockey team I coach, which I hope to expand on for next season. Maybe I'll make a film version of Kaylee's Story with the kids this summer, that would be so much fun... Anyhow, as you can clearly see, I totally nerd out on this stuff. So even though I'm no hollywood director, my youthful ambitions still have a place in my life. And I think that's pretty omanko-lickin' cool.

(For some reason the banner hates me, but I was inspired for this post by the Finish the Sentence Friday blog hop. What did YOU want to do when you were younger?)

15 comments:

  1. I used to want to be famous too but I'm pretty sure it's mostly worn off now.

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    1. really? I don't know if that little nagging hope ever died in me. :)

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  2. Wow, that sounded so cool and really would have love to see the video. And if you were having trouble doing our button right click, then copy and paste the image address. If you need any help, just ask and try to help :) And thanks for linking this up with us and hope to see you back next week. Also following you now, too!!

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    1. yeah, I supposed I could grab the image alone, the html in the box just didn't work

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  3. That sounds awesome. I'm glad you're getting to do at least a little of your dream now.

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  4. Your Godzilla X-files reminded me of two friends in high school who wrote "Malice" - a spoof on "Dallas." I was cast as Lucy and spent a weekend videotaping episodes with about a dozen other kids. Thank goodness it will never show up on You Tube. Cool that you've kept your childhood ambitions alive!

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    1. hahaha. Oh, don't you wish you could share it though?

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  5. You're not going to believe this, but I actually re-edited an episode of "The X-Files" for my high school technology class and dubbed over it in Spanish for my Spanish class! (I was Scully, obviously, and my brother was Mulder.) What a strange coincidence.

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    1. hahah! of course you did. We always were on the same wave-length. Hockey, X-files, nerdiness (mac/carleton), LOL that's awesome.

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  6. I rather identified with your dream of fame, in that I have always found satisfaction in working behind the scenes, provided, of course, that I believed that I influenced the end product. Almost as if, recognizing the lack of 'frontman' quality, I saw that the one who 'turned the lights on and off' the person who raised or lowered the curtain was, in fact, the critical point in any kind of performance/art of any other event involving an audience.
    good post.

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    1. thanks. Yeah, I got a lot of pride out of making sets and prepping props and costumes. In a way, there's more creativity in the behind the scenes parts

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  7. I think growing up we all wanted some fame and fortune. No we all have to work 9-5 for a living. I was a broadcast major in college. Hoped to make a career in entertainment. Ah, teh dreams of youth.

    Yet, in this day and age just get preggers at 16 and you become a reality TV star!

    www.blog.theregularguynyc.com

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    1. We all want to be famous, and so few people are...

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  8. I must watch your movie! MUST! I grew up watching the old godzillas and I have this imaginary love affair with Fox Mulder, only I forget its imaginary! Great post!

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