"The Approach" Production experience

I thought I would share the production experience of making The Approach documentary for my final with some behind the scenes of my own experience on the project.  When I first signed up for this documentary class I didn't know what to expect, but after the first day after meeting the crew, I was sure we would end up with something worthwhile, because of the variety of personalities in the class.  All of other treatments presented were really interesting and had great potential to tell a story that most could relate to.  Once we had presented our ideas.  We all voted on a treatment and began within the next few days pulling together our characters and setting up shoots and interviews.  I felt especially lucky because most of these people that we would be following for this film were people that I grew up with in this community it was my environment.
Here is a photo of us before we knew each other, in the beginning.

 The idea of this movie was to encourage those who watched it to connect with the choices we make in our life, as far as doing the things we love, the things that give us passion or doing things for the money or  because we have to, and finding those who find a way to incorporate the two..  It focuses on how each of us approach our lives, our philosophies, and our passions.
Making this film was a great reminder of teamwork to me.  This could not have been accomplished if we had not worked together.  We all had many aspects to contribute which is why I think that we completed this endeavor in the short amount of time we were given. Not to say we didn't run into frustrations along the way.  At one point we thought we had lost all the footage to a shoot that took us almost 8 hours, after hiking into the location and packing cameras and audio up a 300 foot cliff. Here are my hands after the day of shooting and ascending up the Jumar to the top and repelling down with the crew.  Not something you want to be wasted time!

Over the period of production I think all of us have been able to relate to the theme of our story, "some live what they love others make time to do what they love."  We all at one point I think reflected on this with our own lives. I know that I myself did.  It made me really grateful that Im finally doing what I feel passionate about and that is being a part of telling others story, their experiences and perspectives in life.

Working with Phil Tuckett, Ben Braten, and Luke Draper was a pleasure and an education. This made me realize how lucky we are to have the resources we do as students of Dixie State College.