I believe the difficulty starts with imagery; no two people’s imagination is the same. If an author described a woman as having long flowing red hair with a petite nose – we would both have a different picture in mind.

See – two different images, but both potentially describe what the author has written.

In contrast, the book “Miss Peregrine’s Home for Peculiar Children” is based on vintage photographs and the author, Ransom Riggs uses them to illustrate his book and his book trailer. Mr. Riggs is a writer and a filmmake who clearly knows a thing or two about production. Using live action in combination with compelling narration and some very unusual photos, he has produced a riveting book trailer.

It’s not often that photos inspire a work of fiction, and in a quote from EW.com he says, ”I was developing the story as I was finding the photos. I’d find a particularly evocative photo and I’d say, ‘I need to work this in somehow.’

The LA Times’ Deborah Netburn, who talked to Riggs, writes, “…really great found photography is hard to come by, so Riggs started contacting the big guns in the found photography world, including Robert E. Jackson, a collector whose photos were featured in a show at the National Gallery. Jackson and others opened up their archives to Riggs and allowed him to borrow whatever images he needed (a list of images and the collections they are from are in the back of his book). After looking at close to a 100,000 photos, he eventually amassed a pool of 300 to 400 usable pictures and whittled that down to the 44 images he used in the book.”

See for yourself – I think this is one of the best book trailers out there, I can only hope the book lives up to the preview.

In the first place – I’m never worried.  I may be concerned or I may be strategically thinking about how to solve a problem, but there isn’t really any problem that can’t be solved.  Ever. Whether it’s the lead actor in the production who’s suddenly stricken ill during filming, or whether the network hates everything you’ve shot even though they’ve signed off on it – all of these ‘problems’ have work arounds and can and have been solved.  So, there really isn’t anything to worry about.  But, during my last production we did a lot of hand held shooting very quickly and there wasn’t always an opportunity to have a monitor available so I could see what was being shot as it was being shot.  When I asked the DP to make sure he captured a particular shot at a particular angle I was told, “no worries.”  When I told the DP I  needed to reshoot something, I was told “it’s all good.”  Now, I’m not singling out this DP, because in fact he had a great eye, but he wasn’t the only crew member to give me the ‘no worries’ brush off.

I repeat, I’m not worried; I only want to ensure that what I need to get on tape is gotten.  I want to leave no doubt in my mind that when I enter the edit room everything I need will be there.  It’s part of my job to check, double check, and triple check.  That’s one of the things I do, and I do it very well.

So when a producer asks: Were the final changes incorporated into the script, or did you check to make sure the grip trucks had their permits changed or , or, or… the answer is either ‘yes’ or ‘no.’  It’s pretty simple. I want a definitive answer. Sound harsh?  Not really – at the end of a production cycle you want to make sure you deliver more than what the network expected.  A ‘yes’ or a ‘no’ helps the producer guide the production to a winning result.

I had the pleasure of working with Fred when I was producing for the first over the air subscription based TV network. He developed the logo, promotion and the marketing.  Those were the heady days of cable television when anything was possible, because most of what we were producing hadn’t been seen before.  That’s exactly how the MTV logo was viewed.  A logo that had the ability to change with the seasons, a mood, an emotion or a thought, a logo that was flexible but didn’t lose its identity.  The chunky “M” couldn’t be mistaken for any other network.  The logo also contained the words ‘music television’ as the tag line – after all that’s exactly what the network was – all music all the time.  But that was then, and this is now and if you can find a music video on MTV today, you’re either working the night shift or you rise before the sun does. For the past ten years the network has moved away from music to produce original programming that features real people.  Their programming has been devoid of music and now their 30 year old logo has undergone a change.  They’ve removed the tag line ‘music television’.

While the actual programming for the past ten years has been stripped of music videos – with the logo change, it’s official.  No more music in MTV.

There are probably two hundred fifty thousand, nine hundred and twenty five details that have to be taken care of before a show hits the air.  I know exactly how to get those details done. The creative, the writing, negotiating, scheduling, contracts, rights and clearances, crews, talent, locations, permits, and post-production. I have a proven track record and have never gone over budget or missed a deadline.  And I bring a whole lot of creativity, passion and enthusiasm to the project.

I’m also the founder and co-creator of Romance Novel TV, a new way for romance readers to get their daily dose of what they love.  Why romance novels?  Because I actually read them, I’m a huge fan. So why not?

Romance Novel TV features exclusive video interviews and segments with best-selling authors like Nora Roberts, Lisa Kleypas, J.R. Ward, Suzanne Brockman and so many others.  I figured with a romance novel being sold every five seconds and 64 million women reading them, they’d enjoy an exclusive behind the scenes look at some of their favorites.