This will only be up for a short time…
Vegan Love (HD) from veganfilmmaker on Vimeo.
So, I’ve just returned from my trip Rio de Janeiro, Brazil for the 12th International Vegan Festival with no jetlag, sunburns, or hangovers. May sound like a pretty uneventful trip, but I had a great time! The purpose for attending the festival was to show my short film “Vegan Love” along with a little speech about my approach to vegan advocacy with filmmaking.
I did have great Portuguese subtitles for the film with the help of Beatriz Medina from the SVB (the Brazilian vegan association). However, as the concept and humor in my film are very English in nature, I was a bit concerned about how the film would be received with the language and culture gap.
To my surprise, most of the audience laughed in the right parts and many even came up to me afterwards to tell me how much they enjoyed the film. The icing on the vegan cake was when someone told me that watching the film had reinforced their vegan lifestyle by being able to associate with the
main character. In hindsight, I would say that the trip had also reinforced my passion and drive for vegan advocacy by seeing firsthand how large the movement is becoming around the world.
It was a very uplifting moment to see that my film was having a positive impact
with vegans on the otherside of the planet. I have taken that positive momentum with me and am now back in the US and back at work on developing my feature length film.
In all, I had a wonderful time in Brazil and was astonished by the warmth and openness of so many different people in Rio, vegan and non-vegan alike. I am already thinking of how and when I can return.
Other tidbits:
If you are ever in Rio and want to try some great raw vegan food, I highly recommend Universo Organico. The raw lasagna is amazing.
Also, there were two people that I was supposed to send a copy of the film to in Brazil. If you are reading this blog, can you please forward your address to me again and I will send along a copy. Your address was lost in my journey back to the US.
It has been nearly a year since beginning work on my graduation film at the London Film School and I am very happy to announce that Vegan Love has now been completed. I have just finished the DVDs and send m
ost of them off to cast and crew members of the film. I have also now officially graduated with a Masters degree from the London Film School. !!!WHOOPEE!!!
During the past year, I have put every ounce of available energy into making my graduation film the best it could be. Most of that time I found myself stretched to new limits of endurance by trying to manage the hectic pace. I made countless mistakes along the way; my only hope was to learn from those mistakes quickly enough not to repeat them the next time around. While far from perfect, I am satisfied with the final product of Vegan Love. Just being satisfied may not sound like much of an accomplishment given my high expectations for the film, but I have reached the goals I had set for myself in making the film. It will now be in the hands of the viewing audience.
I would like to briefly mention what I consider being the biggest lesson gained from making Vegan Love: the difficulty of trying to do everything myself. This advice goes out to film students out there reading this blog for any glimmer of what to expect on their film productions and how to prepare for it. The most obvious problems relate to staying creative when you have to organize the crew and events like the top-tier manager of a large corporation. Let’s say right brain vs. left brain. Some filmmakers (like Robert Rodriguez) work well by doing everything themselves, but most do not. Filmmaking for most is a social activity. It is crucial that you be able work with others. Many times in the filmmaking process (from writing, to production, to editing, to P&A) I became so stressed from trying to do everything myself that I felt I had lost site of the overall intentions of my work. While it was an immensely beneficial learning process, the final film product could have been much better had I checked my ego at the door and delegated out the work to specialists in their areas of filmmaking.
For the blog readers that have personally contributed to my film, I owe all of you a heartfelt “THANK YOU” for all of your help. And, for any of those reading that contributed to the film and have not yet received a DVD, please email me!
I will soon be entering Vegan Love into the film festival circuit. I hope to promote the raw vegan lifestyle from inside the vegan community with an eye toward a feature length film...stay tuned for updates...
First of all, my apologies for the long delay! I have been very busy with the editing of Vegan Love. It is coming along very well. I am hoping to finish editing and tracklaying (sound editing) in two weeks. Once that is finished, my next goal will be to have a professional sound dub and grading session (colour correction) and hopefully a final output before Christmas!
I finished filming as planned on the 9th and 10th November. The shoot went remarkably well considering so many locations and such little time. On Sunday, we filmed 4 different locations in 4 different parts of London in 9 hours! On Monday, we began at the National Gallery of London at 7am, then moved to Neil’s Yard Café in Covent Garden, and finished at Eat and Two Veg Restaurant at midnight! On Tuesday, we even filmed a short scene on Tuesday at Foyles Bookstore on Charing Cross Rd. from 8am-10:30am.
I am very thankful to my crew who worked extremely hard and ensured that everything was done as efficient and professional as possible.
It was a very busy two days, but I wouldn’t trade the experience for anything. It is an amazing feeling to actually be creating something that has been in my head for months.
I will be adding more details soon. In the meantime, here are a couple of pics from the Shoot on 10th November by Edgar Dubrovskiy:
