The Filmmakers 412 Podcast is the brainchild of Michael Ray. (That’s me!)
I’ve been an established commercial photographer here in Pittsburgh for many years now, specializing in food photography and commercial portraits. (and yes, I do headshots too :o)
With the growing demand for video, I’ve become involved working on many commercial video shoots, sometimes as the cameraman, but many others as the “lighting and sound” part of the team. As a way to develop my skills as a sound guy, I started loaning myself out on weekends to some people that I heard were making little movies.
What I soon discovered was there is a small not-so-small community of passionate filmmakers that I never knew existed. I just couldn’t believe that there were all these people that donated their time to making films on the weekends. It just seemed a little weird to me, but then after pitching in a couple of weekends, the bug bit me.
That’s how I developed my passion for filmmaking.
Like I’ve heard countless times, “sound is half the picture”, and it’s often times a weak link in many low-to-no budget films. At of this date (3/20), I’ve worked on over thirty films created by local Pittsburgh filmmakers, usually as the sound guy, and I feel like I’m making a real contribution to the success of many of these videos. I feel “needed!”
I thought I’d start this podcast so that local filmmakers could keep up to date on what’s going on the community and so that we can all share information that might make us all better filmmakers. This resource will also come in handy when filmmakers are looking to reach out to new cast and crew. There’s a lot to learn about a person by listening to them be interviewed about what they do…
So that’s why this page / podcast exists. I have to warn you though, I’ve never done a podcast before, so please don’t expect a slick presentation and please be forgiving of all my mistakes. If nothing else, I do promise that the sound quality will be pretty good… :o)
If you have any ides on how to improve either the podcast or the webpage, please let me know and I’ll consider all suggestions. Also, please feel free to let me know who you think may make a good interview and what might be some good questions to ask my subjects. (my email)
And while I have your attention… If yunz guys ever need a good sound guy, please let me know. If you’d like to see list of my sound projects and a sound equipment list, please check this out. BTW – I have worked on a bunch of paying gigs too, just so you don’t think I’m totally crazy. I actually prefer those…