My Life as a Movie Extra

First let me say that I am amazed that there are people who actually seek this type of work out with the hope that someone, somehow will notice them in a crowd and say, "Let me talk to that guy/gal over there."

In brief working as an extra for a movie means long hours (12 in my case) at minimum wage, an unpaid hour break for lunch that you have to buy and waiting and waiting to be called only to sit in the back of the scene where no one will ever be able to focus on your face.

I was fortunate to be right in the middle of two scenes with George Clooney for his upcoming movie, Up In The Air, scheduled to come out this fall. We were filming in the C concourse of Metro Airport's McNamara building which you access by descending a long escalator and then walking about 150 yards down a tunnel to rise on another long elevator to the C Concourse in the middle of the field. The first scene was shot on the moving walkways there. Clooney and a female actress who had stared in Twilight were approaching on one walkway while I was approaching on the other looking down at a newspaper in my hand.

If you have never been on a shoot (TV, video or movie) it is all about hurrying up and waiting while the crew and director constantly set and reset the lights and sound. In films this first part is done with doubles who are about the same size as the actors. All the while they are doing set up we extras were running through our routines time and time again. Then the actors step in and we probably do the same shot 12 times more. Then they change angles for another set up while we are all still in place and we go through it with the doubles and then another dozen times with the actors.

In all fairness to the crew, actors and extras, a lot of the repetition comes from stuff like the overhead announcements going off (this is a working airport), an excited woman yells out "George" just as he is delivering his lines or someone walks into a scene (Again its a working airport; can you imagine how mad you would be if you were rushing for a plane and a film crew stopped you while they went through their routine?)

A fun part of the experience is sitting around and talking with the other extras while waiting. They come from all walks of life Phys Ed instructors for grade school, an aspiring Miss Michigan who works for a PR agency, a liquor salesman, a former Channel 4 newscaster and, of course, an unemployed broadcaster. A funny and touching aspect of the day was that we had a group of 8 young men with closely cropped hair dressed in full military garb. They were so convincing that George Clooney came up to them at one point and asked them where they had served which lead to a little embarrassment and a lot of laughs. People were constantly stopping these young actors in military garb and sincerely thanking them for their service. One mother asked a couple of these guys to have a picture taken with her little boy and then told them that "You have made his day!"

My second scene with George Clooney was shot in the tram that runs overhead in the main terminal. I was standing 5 feet from him in the shot that featured him talking on a cell phone while seated in the bench across from me. If that scene is kept, look for the corner of a tan trench coat just off to his right in the distance...that's mine!

When you work on a set like this you see the incredible economic impact that a movie has on our area from Teamsters driving extras to the set, to catering companies serving the crew, 180 extras at a time (albeit at minimum wage!), lighting tech's, make up people, casting agents...the list goes on and on. There is a very real impact and we need to fight any fool in Lansing who questions the validity of this industry in Detroit. GM may be going bankrupt but Hollywood is far from it.

Ah well, it's all over for now and I will sink back into my well deserved anonymity, just another face in the real crowd. Lucky for me that I came home to a loving welcome from a very real family.

The Great Vista Debacle

I recently bought a new desktop (Dell Inspiron 530, Dual Core, 2 Gig Ram, 250 Gig HD) for my home office primarily for my wife's email and as a back up computer. The old one died unceremoniously before Christmas...Hello, Santa.

I confess that most of my wounds, as far as computers are concerned, are self-inflicted and this past Sunday I decided, in a momentary but serious lack of judgment, to use the disk that came with the computer to upgrade to Vista (Business). I really prefer Vista's layout and even some of the security functions (not the accursed UAC!) and, after all, Dell had included it with the machine so it must be OK! NOT!

After a relatively long (60+ minutes) to install Vista without any error messages, I rebooted the machine and was presented with the friendly log in screen. As soon as I logged on the machine gave me a BSOD (Blue Screen of Death) and an error message I had never seen before. It was all downhill after that, nothing would work, not even Safe Mode with Networking (allows you to connect to the Internet while in Safe Mode.) DESPAIR!

I spent the rest of the next three days trying to Google the answer with little result, emailing Tom Diroff and Ed Rudel, our two tech experts from our computer show and spending over an hour on the phone with my own personal help desk, i.e. Ed, all to no avail. After sleeping on the couch a couple of nights (Ginny was not happy with my tinkering) I decided to simply do a complete clean install of Vista and then restore her data which I had saved on an external drive. Even that proved to be full of grief because the new Vista was pretty much without most of the key drivers needed because it was supposed to be an upgrade installation over Win XP. So I had to manually restore many of the drivers from the disks that Dell supplied with the machine, e.g. the drivers for the DVD player so that I could install the other programs like my printer software.

The moral of the story? If it ain't broke, don't fix it! I do have to say that I much prefer the new Vista system, even with its problems and Ginny doesn't seem to notice the difference since she only uses Outlook 2007 which looks exactly the same.

At least I'm off the couch...for the time being.

Multi-tasking Inauguration

I just couldn't help myself, it was too much of a temptation. During Tuesday's inauguration, CNN streamed the ceremonies online in conjunction with Facebook. On my computer screen was a flash video window with the CNN reports and the proceedings while on the right hand side of that same page was a panel that allowed me to see either what my friends were posting about the event or switch to see what everyone was saying. It was a remarkable experience, kind of like standing on the Mall in Washington, DC, waiting for the show to begin and striking up a conversation with the people around you about the event. The only problem was that I eventually got to talking to half a dozen people at one time and began to lose track of the event itself.

Soon the whole multi-tasking thing got way out of hand. I had the TV on in the living room to record the event for my wife Ginny, a TV on in the office with me (because I discovered that CNN/Facebook coverage lagged behind the real event by 30 seconds) to follow the event as it happened, the CNN/Facebook coverage on my computer (muted because it was behind) and in the meantime I was trying to install Vista on my wife's computer! I'm afraid that I probably missed some important parts of the inaugural address but I figured that I would catch it later.

It amazes me that my grandchildren somehow manage to accomplish a lot of things while doing many things at once. I discovered through all this that I am simply not up to multi-tasking more than two things at one time, such as walking and chewing gum while the world around me Twitters itself into a cloud of ADD oblivion.

Hail to the Chief

What a remarkable confluence of history: The inauguration of the first African American president of this country following the remembrance of Dr. Martin Luther King's valiant struggle for just such a moment. I can imagine Dr. King and St. Peter leaning on one of Heaven's parapets looking down on the events Tuesday morning when suddenly the gatekeeper of glory nudges Dr. King and says, "See, I told you, we shall overcome."

May the "we" truly be all of us as we put aside political divisions, racial mistrust and economic differences to once again stand as "We the People of these United States...", committed to raising one another up and stepping over the threshold of fear and indifference to apply our considerable skills to "bearing one another's burdens."

I invite you to join me and take a moment and pray for our new president and his coworkers for wisdom, courage and decisiveness. Then let us ask God to show us"... not what our country can do for us, but what we can do for it."

Jobless in Appleland

Pardon me if I don't shed a tear or phone my broker to dump my Apple shares (as if I could afford them!) Apparently Apple's own Elvis has left the building. Steve Jobs, a brilliant innovator, resuscitator of the Mac fortunes and all around promotional genius is taking what some believe his final leave of absence from the company he made enormously profitable. The rationale that is being given is that his "hormone imbalance" is much more serious than imagined and that he needs the time off to get well. Lest I sound callous, let me say I sympathize with Steve and his family as they go through this trial again and hope that he recovers completely.

Now, on to the main point, what is Apple going to do to keep its creative process that has produced some of the most exciting and trend setting devices imaginable going without "the man"? I don't think the real issue is whether Apple can survive without Steve or not but whether it can grow up in time to become a self-sustaining purveyor of digital excellence.

I have lived in a country that was run by a dictator for many years and then freed by the democratic process. One of the most insidious effects of that dictatorship, however, is that it leaves a whole generation of people enslaved internally. Conversations constantly surrounded how much "safer" things had been when the military ruled the country and people were summarily executed for stealing a loaf of bread. At least in the public eye, it seems that this same attitude exists with the benevolent dictatorship of Steve Jobs. "Things were so much better when Steve was in charge. What will we do now?" How about think for yourselves and keep Apple moving in the right direction...ahead with or without Mr. Jobs.

New year, new computer

Well that seems to be the way that it goes with my life! In 2007 a cup of tea executed my trusty Dell Inspiron laptop and I replaced it with my MacBook Pro 15". This year old age finally did in the motherboard on desktop that Computer Builder's Warehouse (remember them?) custom made for me on our show around 2003. I had been getting close to maxed out on the 60 Gig hard drive and the old processor kept shutting down mysteriously until one day it started no more.

So it was time to go shopping. I had been thinking about buying an iMac 20" or 24" all-in-one desktop but I simply couldn't afford the "Apple Tax". No matter what other Mac Boys and Girls may tell you, generally speaking, comparably equipped PC's are at least 20% cheaper than their pretty Apple counterparts. I know that this is heresy but more and more of us former Windows folks who switched are saying it and even the great Leo Laporte admitted to it on one of his podcasts this past year.

Being short on cash, I made a pilgrimage to Micro Center in Madison Heights where my friendly salesman, Jeff Kurz, suggested I look at the Dell Inspiron 530 desktop which was on sale for $399. So I gave up my Mac dreams and went for the PC! The machine is basically my wife's for email, documents and the occasional picture. I also use it for back up of some key programs such as my Pro Tools LE recording software.

Here are the specs: Dell Inspiron Dual Core 2.20 Ghz processor, 2 Gig Ram, 250 Gig Hard Drive, DVD RW, Card reader ports, Win XP Pro (upgrade disk to Vista Home Premium included).

So far it has been a pretty fast little machine and real pleasure to work with. The only problems I am having right now are trying to get the Documents and Settings from the old hard drive. Problem: it's just the hard drive, the computer died and I hooked it up externally to the new machine with a USB drive. I just can't get my wife Ginny's or my Contacts to switch over. Any suggestions?

Consumer Trends in 2009

Netbooks: These smaller than normal (9-12 screens) computers are fast becoming the growing edge of computer sales according to some market analysts. Portability, battery life and most of all a modest price point make them extremely attractive to a public already indoctrinated into handheld computing with the iPhone. Big question: Will Apple get on board with their own netbook (perhaps a larger version of an iPhone/iPod Touch?)

Get ready for Windows 7, Microsoft’s new generation of operating system if only because Redmond has got to shift the focus from its much maligned Vista OS even if Win7 is the same thing under the hood. No more dawdling, Mr. Ballmer; put up or shut up in 2009.

Feast on Memory (RAM) and Stock up on Storage (Hard Drive). Prices on both RAM for your CPU and Hard Drive space have dropped like the stock market. Why not save some money and just juice up that old computer? Find out how much memory your computer can use (remember that 32 bit machines can only use a little more than 3 Gigabytes of RAM); I recently bought 4 Gigs of RAM for my MacBook Pro for around $60. Look for quality in the hard drives but buy big and back up! Prices are so low! (http://www.alts.net/ns1625/winchest.html) The cost per gigabyte of memory in Feb. 2000 for a 20 GB Fujitsu hard drive was $19.73/GB. In April 2005 a Western 250 GB sold for $1.15/GB and right now a Western My Book 1 Terabyte (1,000 Gigabytes) sells for $.18/GB.

The impact of a tech-savvy president will be felt far and wide. Soon-to-be President Barak Obama is a child of the electronic age and is completely comfortable communicating in that format. What impact will this have on political life and our national future? Probably not much to start with but what happens when Pres. Obama is stymied by Congress and takes his case to YouTube or social networking sites to make his point to the American people directly?

Telcom feeding frenzy. Expect the few remaining, giant telcom players to start squeezing consumers for higher rates, e.g my wife just got a text message on her ATT phone inviting her to activate text messaging so that she could be charged $.20/message incoming and outgoing. Parents, watch out for those exploding phone bills when your teens start tapping incessantly to keep in touch with their many BFF’s. A major cable company is “bragging” about a $24/month local digital phone call plan! Vonage offers the whole country and a few of our neighboring nations for about the same price. I predict that one of the major telcoms will gobble up Vonage soon and silence it so that they can reduce competition and wring the most out of the customer. Long live capitalism!

Are you my “friend”? Social networks sites will start having a deeper and deeper penetration into the culture first as baby boomers with time on their hands join Facebook to see the grandchildren who are often spread all over the country because of scare jobs. Secondly, because finding work is all about who you know and not so much what you know, professional networks like LinkedIn, Plaxo and Pulse will become the place to find new jobs, clients and colleagues.

What are your predictions?