May 6, 2025

Two Week Monster Fight

This is Finish Your Monsters, a weekly blogletter about the creative process. I'm sharing adventures in art and life as well as setting CLIFFHANGER goals for myself, so--

DID I MAKE MY GOAL?

Big picture, I’m working away on the post-production of our horror film, Dead Media. I’m editing the film in chronological order. Two weeks ago, I committed to the goal of finishing the first cut of the film.

And I completed the goal (hooray) but not on time (boo)!

I finished the draft this past Friday at about 9 pm after 16 straight hours of editing.

Now I’m in Minneapolis to work with a friend on the music for the film as well as dive into more of the post-production.

As I type, I’m sitting in my childhood bedroom where several scenes take place in the film. I’m looking forward to doing a polish on the editing of those scenes while sitting in this actual room and see if that causes a portal to open up in time and space.

If you’re interested in helping me pull this film across the finish line, I need to raise a bit more money for post-production. You can make a one time tax-deductible donation via Film North here.

ADVENTURES OF THE WEEK--

The two weeks since my last Finish Your Monsters blog post have truly been about the nature of my “Finish Your Monsters” mantra.

In my experience, a creative project can only keep moving if you complete drafts. The whole thing. So you can step back and see what still needs work. So you can share it with people you trust and get perspective by seeing it through other eyes.

Finishing a thing is the GOAL.

And in my experience, the best way to achieve that goal is deciding you MUST. Creating an iron clad contract with yourself that you are going to do this. To make it an absolute priority like sleeping or eating.

Which sounds great until I realize I’m not getting enough sleep and my diet consists mostly of frozen pizza.

But the point stands! If the goal is to finish a draft, I have to make it an absolute priority which means doing battle with my old enemies, time and fear.

Even the most important creative projects can often take a backseat when there are so many other essential things in life—family, friends, doomscrolling, work, doomscrolling, eating, sleeping, doomscrolling, getting distracted by a new creative project that is less scary, etc. (Perhaps these are not all essential, but still time-takers.)

So time is a challenge, but so is that constant, creeping dread that the project won’t turn out perfect.

I’d been taking my time with the edit, really perfecting scenes. I could have spent two more months editing just the first draft. Intellectually, I know it’s okay for the scenes to be rough but the little fear demon in my gut would not let me move on.

So I had to keep screaming this logical truth at the demon:

“A first draft is freeing! Because the goal is NOT perfection. The goal of is being DONE! Only then can you get closer to perfection!”

So these last two weeks, I really pushed myself. I made finishing the first cut of the film my priority while still making time for essentials.

I recorded several episodes of ForceCenter (my very fun part time day job), spent some time with my wife (we had a great time seeing SINNERS), talked to my Dad once a week, ate, and slept (for fewer hours, but still).

But other than that, I had to sacrifice to make this a priority. I skipped the blog last week, I skipped a few social things, I skipped going on my daily walks, but most difficult of all—I skipped PERFECTION.

Last Friday was my drop dead “this draft must be done” deadline. In order to accomplish that, I made myself do a very rough pass on two of the more complicated scenes at the end of the film.

Friday night, I celebrated with my wife. I posted about finishing the first draft on social media and got lots of nice, kind support.

On Saturday afternoon, I had the thrill of watching a rough cut of the film with my wife. Sitting there on the same spot on the couch where I wrote the first draft of the film’s script in five days back in October of 2023.

Watching the first draft of the actual FILMED FILM was a great experience. The time and care I had taken with editing showed in so man scenes. The scenes toward the end with faster editing were harder to watch. But for those more quickly edited scenes, I realized things they needed. For both scenes, they were changes that were made clear by seeing the film as a whole.

So even if I had taken the time to slowly carefully edit those scenes, I STILL would’ve needed to make changes that were only clear from having finished the entire draft, the entire monster.

Now my mind is full of ideas for the second pass on the edit. On the way to Minneapolis, I fell asleep on the plane and had long dreams about editing my flight.

This morning, I’m off to start work with a friend on the score for the film. A great reward for finishing the first draft monster.

Thanks to everyone reading for the support and encouragement!

LIGHT PLUGS—

The Nightmare Adorable!

I wrote and directed this short horror film back in 2023.

AWOOGA: Can you help us get to 1000 views on YouTube? I’d love to get more views on this short film as I look ahead to the promotion of Dead Media.

You can watch here!

Speaking of Dead Media, We’ve got a fiscal sponsorship with the great Minnesota organization Film North. They can accept one-time donations that will go directly toward finishing the film: SCORE, VFX, COLOR GRADING, etc. It’s like a Kickstarter where the rewards are A) a tax deduction and B) helping us make the film.

For full info, please check out the page for the upcoming horror film, DEAD MEDIA!

Or if you have any questions about supporting the film, feel free to reach out to me personally!

MY GOAL FOR THE WEEK--

I’ve got to spin a lot of plates to keep things moving on the post-production for Dead Media. So I need to multitask my goals. So my goal(s) for next week is a minimum of 5 planning emails to creative partners and the next draft of the film edit.

YOUR GOAL FOR THE WEEK--

I would absolutely LOVE to hear what you're working on this week in the comments below. What's your goal? How can I help you literally finish your monsters?

A LITTLE SKETCH--

This week’s sketch is a completely relaxed and relaxing image of a fear demon grasping at an embodiment of time itself. For fun!