Editing Attitudes

I wanted to get cracking on editing the film the day after our second day of shooting.  My trusty cameraman didn't bring the files in for me to start.  That's the first full day of potential editing lost due to me making rookie assumptions. 

On this day however my cameraman offered and agreed to help edit the final film. My second big mistake came from allowing almost a week to go by of expecting my cameraman to show up when they said they would to start editing on their lap top.  The third was assuming they would reply to any form of attempted communication. 

When a reply finally came it was flooded with yet more empty promises and assurances that reminded me ever so much of the phantom shot list that never was. Why didn't you just start the edit yourself I hear you scream? This was my fourth big mistake.  Allowing my panic to be calmed by words that are a lot easier to say than to do. "I have made a start" and "The rough cut will be done for thursday" will both now echo as a constant reminder that I cannot expect people to have the same drive and passion for my project that I do. 

The day of the deadline arrived and as agreed (again) I am waiting on my cameraman's arrival with the highly anticipated rough cut. I had decided that I would just finish off whatever he had started and hand it in that day. Phonecalls, emails, messages and a few smoke signals were not enough to make me accept the obvious, he wasn't coming. 

A few days later and having left the country and missed the deadline I gave my producer the instructions to hand in whatever he done how little or small.  I had still not got any sort of reply but my ever reliable producer managed to track a reply down that he was not actually aware that he was meant to be editing, he was doing his own film and didn't appreciate this shoddy and informal treatment. 

Well there we have it, all I had to do to get a reply was send my messages out with an official BMC letterhead. 

I can honestly put no blame for my film not being edited yet on anyone but myself.  A relaxed attitude can only take you so far and I see this a massive yet harsh learning experience.