Don’t Be Afraid of an Adventure.

[Brian Stoppee]

A few weeks ago, we heard some entertainment news of a famous actress/spokesperson embarking on a somewhat risky TV series role. She’s a multimillionaire. It’s not as if she needs the money. Some “handlers” surely told her it wasn’t  a good idea. But she did it anyway.

We have to (love to) read brand manuals for hotels and restaurants. They’re big books which offer “suggestions” (or demands) on how the franchisees of those multimillion dollar operations should conduct business. Such manuals get into everything from guest safety to long lists of the coffees, teas, and whiskeys which have to be available.

We love food & beverage (F&B) and watch way too many cooking shows. It’s very creative stuff. We love to hang out with chefs, bartenders, and food service managers. They are a cross between the world’s most brilliant creative minds and astute business managers.

Brand manuals, for the world’s top hotels, are pretty much Adobe Classroom in a Book for making something really cool for breakfast.

We have had the honor to become certified in a few aspects of hospitality. The learning tools are pretty much identical to becoming an Adobe Certified Expert (ACE). Yes, there’s something very similar to rough cutting 5 hours of footage into a 2 minute news feature, which must air at 6:00p, tonight, and making a super sexy egg dish for a dozen people every, 15 minutes, for the next 3 hours. It’s all insane production which has to dazzle and delight. It’s spectral cooking masterpiece at 6:45:15 and if not carefully executed, a disaster at 6:47:00.

If you overcook the eggs, you’re history. It’s like “dead air” in broadcast news when your “package” isn’t ready the second that it’s supposed to be on everyone’s television screen.

But, if you know the brand manuals, backwards and forwards, it’s like knowing how to cut that news segment in Adobe Premiere Pro.

What’s our take-away from these experiences?

The man/woman behind the curtain has to know how to flip the switches at the exact second. It’s an admitted adrenaline rush. It’s pretty much like when someone on stage sings a specific note and a few hundred lights change,

How much of it is technology and how much is creativity?

You reset the stage once, twice or three times a day. The manual guides you. You’re lost without it. Making 100 perfect Italian Omelets isn’t that different from retouching 100 photos with Photoshop’s Content Aware tools, by Noon.

Both of them are quite a high wire act which should never get boring. Don’t let “handlers” tell you to not take a manageable risk. Listen to the creative lobe of your brain, experiment with those exercises in the manuals, and then smartly flex your creative muscles.

[rodneyb56060189]

will you marry me and make food for me ?

[rodneyb56060189]

sounds like an adventure to Me, anyway...  hehe.

[Brian Stoppee]

rodneyb56060189  wrote

sounds like an adventure to Me, anyway...  hehe.

Funny story. When Janet & I got married we were always traveling to do seminars and trade shows after our first book was published. Janet was looking through a magazine, as we drove. An article said most people only know how to cook 10 things (this was around 30 years ago). We started counting what we knew how to do and sure enough there was only 10. We lived in restaurants and loved food but didn't know how to cook much.

Now food and beverage (known as "F&B") has become an extension of our creative exploration.

We did a meeting today with a businessman who said, "This isn't your job—this is your passion." He's right.

[rodneyb56060189]

hehe, fun stuff. I've been lucky to meet a few people who are in F&B biz in past, and found what you say true. It is full of really nice creative people who are passionate about their work. And contrary to the soup Nazi in NYC most people treat their fellow workers and customers really nice.

One guy who used to contribute here travels a lot due to spouse's work mostly (they like being together), and consequently he did a lot of hotel and restaurant reviews ( chow hound, etc. ).  Is fun meeting nice people who I can learn from and appreciate, etc.

Oh, well, guess I'll have to keep my eyes open for some old gal who I can hoodwink into cooking for me...

: )

[Brian Stoppee]

rodneyb56060189  wrote

Oh, well, guess I'll have to keep my eyes open for some old gal who I can hoodwink into cooking for me...

That does bring up a fascinating point.

Some people who work media and entertainment ("M+E") have to work at a rapid pace and encounter some "harden" souls and must find a team spirit. The same is true for people in hospitality (hence what the US Dept of Commerce calls "M+E & H").

But, that said, our experience with those creatives communities don't hoodwink very well… but a sincere complement from someone in the know does tend to open doors.

[rodneyb56060189]

I think enthusiasm plays a big part in media (movies, and TV movies, and episodic TV, and Commercials, Industrials, Music Videos, etc.) but there is also a professional aspect that gets behind that enthusiasm ( like if you go to work one day in a bad mood it doesn't matter ). The pro part is simply that you are doing a specific job and you have to give it 100% ( in general you are only as good as your last job). There is (especially as you get older and more experienced with more water under the bridge) a point where words like 'art', and creativity and so on means little. Odd as that sounds. Solving problems requires creativity (or the experience of having seen others solve similar problems with similar equipment at your disposal ) but I know of a film local that abhors the word 'art' when applied to the allied crafts. It's a long story why that is. Has to do with contracts and benefits, etc.

Being involved with the arts and being creative beyond work ( writing in spare time, painting, shooting personal stuff ) has nothing to do with the work aspect, but of course it means you never have disdain for art and creativity.

If you are a really good DP, lets say, you are shooting a script with time restraint (pages per day) and equipment restraints, so you do the best you can and add value to the thing, which is why that particular DP got hired to begin with. Then, after the day is done, it goes to post and you find out what happened re: coverage and so on, how the story played out visually etc.

It is an amazingly complex and busy assembly line of a LOT of people, and it's their jobs ( not art and not fun ), if that makes sense.

When someone says, "Boy, that show really stunk, I'm glad they cancelled it," it means around 400 people just lost their jobs. Oddly enough that same audience is the arbiter of what ratings do, which leads to advertising revenue, and whether a show gets cancelled or not. Therefore, if I can hoodwink someone into believing something they hate is really fantastic, I save 400 jobs and everyone is happy. Well, not me so much cause I still have nobody to cook for me

: (

[Brian Stoppee]

rodneyb56060189  wrote

When someone says, "Boy, that show really stunk, I'm glad they cancelled it," it means around 400 people just lost their jobs.

Janet & I are very involved in assembling the right creative team for very large projects.

These are not overnight things. It always comes back to who is leading the team and does the team really see those people as leaders.

[rodneyb56060189]

sounds very challenging and satisfying.

Good going !

: )

[Brian Stoppee]

rodneyb56060189  wrote

sounds very challenging and satisfying.

Good going !

: )

A few decades ago, I learned about the business side of rock concerts, theatre, etc.

Janet & gained more business expertise from of broadcast days.

What we're learning now is the current state balancing business and creativity. There are many new tools in place to monitor where things are going on a day to day basis as well as project where they could/should be in the weeks/years ahead.

Q. What really gets balanced?

A. The left and right lobes of the brain.

[rodneyb56060189]

Do you have advice for young people who would like to explore the possibility of getting into the entertainment and media business in their home towns ? Maybe they are attending school for communication arts, or theatre or film etc. It seems like such a difficult business to get into where you can begin to earn money at some reasonable time (internships at local radio, TV and theatres usually don't pay at first ? )

[rodneyb56060189]

Giant custody battle rages in MN.

All the tenants here claim the racoon family who lives in back yard near lake is the family of the young racoon that scaled a high rise building in the Twin Cities the other day. They claim he snuck onto a metro mobility bus ( the bus comes here to take people with wheel chairs to the city for entertainment ) and then climbed up on the building to get a good view of the city street.

Some janitor came along and put a 2x4 up near the racoon to coax it down ( he thought the racoon would run down the 2x4 and be safe on ground ). Unfortunately, the racoon got spooked ( "Why is that man trying to prod me with that 2x4 ? " ) and went UP instead of down.

Thus began the chilling and thrilling climb of the racoon to the roof of the building ( he slept for a while on a window ledge cause it was a really long climb ).

Well, it turns out that thousands of MN. residents are claiming the racoon is THEIR racoon ( from their back yards ) and a huge custody battle is raging in an effort to get the racoon back home !

[Brian Stoppee]

rodneyb56060189  wrote

Do you have advice for young people who would like to explore the possibility of getting into the entertainment and media business in their home towns ? Maybe they are attending school for communication arts, or theatre or film etc. It seems like such a difficult business to get into where you can begin to earn money at some reasonable time (internships at local radio, TV and theatres usually don't pay at first ? )

That's a difficult question to answer without knowing where their hometown is located.

North America has 97 states (or provinces or territories) all of which have public higher education systems that offer media technology courses. M+E (media and entertainment) will pass the $1 trillion in gross revenue, this year, in North America (US Dept of Commerce). So, it's a well known economic development driver. However, not all of those 97 governments support film and arts & entertainment offices to drive that engine.

So, in all condor, young people may have to move, to practice their profession.

Fortunately, the days of everything M+E being in LA or NYC are over. Big M+E hubs are all over this continent and some segments of the workforce are home based, thanks to Adobe.

So, my best advise to a young person is "explore, explore, explore."

[Brian Stoppee]

Getting back to the "Adobe Classroom in a Book" analogy, we had a meeting today with some people who design and build homes which are architecturally inspired by their historic surroundings. They verify the need for continuing education which keeps working professionals up to date with ever expanding technologies.

[rodneyb56060189]

Architecture has always fascinated me. I went to a fine art school when youngish, and studied some of that, but was always confounded due to not making it a primary focus. The basics (classical, neo classical, Romanesque, Victorian (tudor) and some weird thing called Rococo and something like Jacobin. Tons of stuff ( who was that guy that drew pictures of details in Venice etc. ? … grew up with Turner visiting his parent's home ...hmmm, can't remember. Anyway, now the technology can make faux marble columns and all kinds of cool stuff. Or build according to landscape (nature around home) like Frank L Wright ? using modern materials that magically blend in with nature around the building.

I college roommate did the models for the freedom French fry tower downtown. Blue prints to model ( talk about fine work re: tiny little parts ! )

My dream for tomorrow ( my new adventure) will be going to toy store and buying tiny people and tiny animals and some kind of balsa wood stuff that I can shape into a little "place to live" when I get old.

I will have to shrink a lot.

[rodneyb56060189]

sometimes I have fun just being silly

: )

[rodneyb56060189]

When I moved to Midwest I had to look up what "craftsman" style was, never heard of it before. My parents home (small ) was cape cod style.

Ranch style is another weird thing. Tons of stuff to keep studying.

[rodneyb56060189]

Just remembered...Ruskin ...his drawings are cool re: details and styles that have not always survived the times

[Brian Stoppee]

rodneyb56060189  wrote

Architecture has always fascinated me. I went to a fine art school when youngish, and studied some of that, but was always confounded due to not making it a primary focus.

As a kid who loved to play in the woods, fields, and streams adjacent to our house, summer allergies often kept me indoors. My mother's drafting table became my sanctuary. Hotels, shopping malls, theatres, and churches came to life there.

Now that's evolved into Adobe Illustrator!

[rodneyb56060189]

It is so cool that you moved along to do what you could do, rather than just lament what you couldn't do. And now use new tools to continue what you love. Very cool.

This is Ruskin thing I just googled...

https://www.google.com/search?q=ruskin+architectural+detail+drawings&spell=1&sa=X&ved=0ahUKEwj0nNGXz...

[Brian Stoppee]

rodneyb56060189  wrote

It is so cool that you moved along to do what you could do, rather than just lament what you couldn't do. And now use new tools to continue what you love. Very cool.

Thank you.

We meet many A+E (architecture and engineering) people who subscriber to both Adobe and Autodesk apps.

[rodneyb56060189]

ADVENTURE FOR THE DAY: FACES ONLY A MOTHER AND FATHER COULD LOVE

"Hello, is this Mr. B. ? "

"Yes, speaking."

"We'd like to hire you to take beautiful photos of a few monkeys. It must be beautiful lighting and poses, as we want to use them for fundraising efforts on the part of a country. Here's a picture of the group. We need shots of them separately, with beautiful backgrounds."

"Oh, sure, no problem. Who are you using for hair and makeup ?"

( to be continued )

[Brian Stoppee]

Janet & I have thousands of images on Getty but we have never hired a stylist for orangutans. (There's always a first time)

[rodneyb56060189]

hehe... I dig it. Hence 'the adventure' aspect !

[Brian Stoppee]

Oh my goodness, yes.

All of media, entertainment, and hospitality is a never ending high wire act. (Be sure the net is string).