Film Directing and Product Management

I have two lives. Now, before you run off to tell my wife, calm down. But really, I have two lives. One of these lives is described on the left side of the piece of paper that is my resume. The other life is on the right side. One of these lives has a future, the other does not. The question is - which one?

The left side is engineering centric. I knew when I was about 12 years old that I wanted to be an electrical engineer, and that aspiration has been achieved. Several years of software design, hardware hacking, working on a Lisa and Mac, worked on a new kind of pda. Most fun has been being a product manager - bringing a product from fuzzy notion to shipping product, and an experience I've had the privelege to repeat with Creo's Virtual Proofing Software, Prinergy, and metabadge. What makes Product Management so attractive to me is that it is applied storytelling.

The right side is full of small, amazingly fun things that have to do with music, video and film. I've done live mixing for bands, and recorded basement tapes of a few. I've shot super 8, and gotten high on the splicing cement. I've been a boom man for college projects, and shot a few videos to learn about non-linear editting. After taking the Director's course at the Vancouver Film School, I came to this conclusion:

Directing film/video is very much like product management. Maybe that's why I like the both. Look at the similarities. 1) You are the leader of a team, of various skills and abilities, who you need to work together to achieve a common purpose. 2) While technical potentials tempt you at every turn, it is your job to stay focussed on the story. 3) Your team works better if you collaborate rather than rule, but sometimes the team looks to you to just make a decision. 4) You are telling a story, and the integrity of that vision is the primary reason behind all the tech.

So, there it is. I'm ready to direct. Where to start?

Time to Start

The ship is sailing, but I've hopped into the trusty kayak and paddled out to jump on.