Ian on World Down Syndrome Day

Today is World Down Syndrome Day. Ian's amped! And then he's not.

I gotta see this film... the song gets my feet tappin' too.

Thanks!

Thanks, everyone, for the kind comments and encouragement on the latest video clip. It helps keep me motivated and on track. The final documentary is going to be at least thirty minutes long and is part educational and part our son's story.

I'm making this video because I want to capture the nuances, the joy and pain, the fear and the happiness of raising a child with Down syndrome. I want to be able to share that with other parents in similar situations as well as with the rest of the world who may not fully understand this journey.

Following Ian

I've started working on a documentary about Ian.

Downtown Detroit in the fountain

More home videos

Walking around the neighborhood, enjoying the summer with the kids.

Depth of field

I have a little cheap camcorder (on the left) that takes the worst footage but is so convenient. Tonight I was determined to create a camcorder that was both easy to take with us (unlike my professional camera) and also captures good footage. I went to the hardware and camera store and for about $25 of PVC and fittings, made a rough depth-of-field adaptor. I got the wrong kind of focusing screen so I have a "dot" right in the middle of every shot, but when I exchange it tomorrow, I think I'll be pleased with the final results.

I shot all this footage a couple of hours ago in front of my office.

Lullaby

Silvi absolutely loves this video.

Great laugh

Untitled from Narrow Ridge on Vimeo.

Railroad Tracks

Tonight was such a gorgeous night that we went down by the lake and walked along the railroad tracks. I took some video and threw this together; it's best viewed full screen (although I'm still struggling with the quality issues during the upload).


Railroad Tracks from Narrow Ridge on Vimeo.

Update: Get them out there

I shot an email to the director - Sophie Hyde - of the Australian documentary and showed her my rant and she's sending me a copy of her film. Look for a review here in the coming weeks. Thanks, Sophie! (I don't care what people say about you Aussies, you're OK in my book :) )

Please, get them out there

OK. So you spend a year or two writing, shooting and editing your short film and then it's shown a few times only to spend the rest of it's life on a shelf somewhere over in... Australia. I keep finding films that I want to see that are unavailable. (Maybe the Australian distribution company sells Region 1 - the US - copies of their DVDs, but I doubt it.)

Like, I really want to see OK, Let's Talk about Me. It's a story told from Eddie's perspective (he's an seventeen-year-old with Down syndrome) about his desire for more independence. It even comes with a nifty little PDF study guide. But, according to the distributor's website, they are bound by contract to not sell the film anywhere except Australia or New Zealand.

My rant for this fine Thursday afternoon.

Movin' on up

Someone is starting to dig the real grub. Sort of. Soundtrack provided by Silvi-Mix-Alot.

Crossing Tahoe

Will at Blueberry Shoes Films has posted a few minutes of his documentary called Crossing Tahoe: A Swimmer's Dream over on his site. It's definitely worth a look.

Put on a record

Updated: Having so many videos on my home page seems to slow down the page load time a bit, so I'm going to just post videos over on the My Videos page. And I uploaded a new one of Silvi singing her ABC's. Enjoy.

Remember when you used to spread all your records out on your bedroom floor and just listen to song after song? Ian and I put together a little "mix-tape" of some our favorite hits from the 80's, with a few current singles sprinkled in there. It's about 10 minutes long, so when you get a break from your day and you just want to hang out with a couple of guys and listen to music, check out our video.

(A disclaimer: I am the world's worst DJ. Secondly, my Final Cut Pro program is on the fritz at home, so I fumbled around with iMovie; this is not a polished video.)

Escuela Mexicana de Arte Down

Can't stop moving

This video makes me feel like a kid again. It's the weekend - Enjoy!


And this video is happy-sad. I love it.

On Being

The Washington Post has created a great project called onBeing, a series of video interviews with people from varying backgrounds intended to help foster understanding. I uploaded the clip on Down syndrome onto Youtube. It's well worth the watch.

Tick, tock

It's been a looong week of waiting. I've been waking up around 5:30 and watching Spanish Univision to pass the time. Also updating the First Friday Films blog and adding a new video on my Videos page that I just finished at work.

Tick...tock...I'm supposed to find out tomorrow if one opportunity will open up. So close and yet...

Avoiding work

Am trying to avoid working at this moment, and am succeeding wonderfully. "Smashing" success, to use a common British colloquialism. I'm scanning in more pictures for my "Photos" section (stop by), perusing YouTube (I stumbled across these four British clips; not for the easily miffed or the queasy), and, obviously, blogging.

The British clips reminded me of my outing to see Borat on Thanksgiving Day. Tracy, my sister, told me how much she and her husband laughed while watching Borat. (She also owns the film Se7en, which should have been a red flag.) After the meal, we brother-in-law's and father-in-law all went to see said movie, on my recommendation. Fortunately, my father-in-law slept for much of the film, as my brother-in-law's are no longer speaking to me. (well, they are, but they now question my taste in films; perhaps it was the recent outing to see Mel Gibson's Christmas family film, Apocalypto, that removed any doubts from their minds.)

I suppose, if one is called for, the moral of the story may go something like this: Borat was crude, and Gibson was rude, but rest assured, my sister is no prude.