It was exciting to learn that I made the front cover of Greensboro’s local rag Yes! Weekly. I know it’s only because the play is fantastic and not because of the photo, but it’s still nice to see.
If you go to the article here you can see another photo that I took with credit.
I also did one more video to promote the final weekend of Fox on the Fairway. If you’re local, you only have three more days to see it so don’t miss it! Get your tickets here.
Last night was the pre-opening of the show, Fox on the Fairway, at Twin City Stage. I think they have all the big donors come and see the play before anyone else does. The director asked me to come and film it and make a short 30 second commercial for the show.
Here it is:
Fox on the Fairway Preview from Ioannis "Yanni" Batsios on Vimeo.
For this show, I did something I’ve learned never to do, I left the ISO on automatic. The corners of the play were too dark and when the characters stood too far in the front, they were too well-lit. So I didn’t want to worry about focusing, zooming and changing the ISO or aperture all at the same time. I was pleasantly surprised with the results after looking at the footage. In an uncontrolled environment, I would use this trick again. Camera Canon Mark ii with the 70-200mm 2.8f lens.
Recently, I had the pleasure to do some promotional work for local theater group Twin City Stage here in Winston-Salem, NC. It’s for their upcoming play Fox on the Fairway which is about golf…I think. I mean, everyone had a golf club in their hands and they were constantly yelling at each other so it must be golf, right?
Anyways, here’s a nice article about the play in our local arts rag.
If you want ticket information, please visit Twin City Stage.
And below are the promotional photos and videos I put together. With direction from Philip Powell.
And some videos:
Fox on the Fairway – Meet the Cast from Ioannis "Yanni" Batsios on Vimeo.
Fox on the Fairway (Do you like comedy?) from Ioannis "Yanni" Batsios on Vimeo.
I just noticed it’s been a month since I last posted. Sheesh. Unfortunately, I have to take jobs I don’t like so I can do the things I do like. I was holed up in a clinic for three days and I struggled to find the inspiration to write. I still haven’t felt like writing since I’ve been back. Tomorrow, tomorrow, I keep telling myself. Before long, twenty years has passed.
Anyways, more will be coming soon. I’m struggling to find a bridge from act 2 to 3, so I’m going to work backwards.
If you have time, check out two Kickstarter campaigns I recently funded:
One is from my friend and fellow photographer Eric Cousineau who’s working on capturing a dying part of American history. Click the link here. If you think he’s asking for too much, remember that he’s using real film, he has to get the books printed and gas is expensive. It’s a great project that will be more appreciated by future generations.
Another is from a local theater company whose play was accepted for the NY Fringe Festival. Click the link here. Theater is hard to fund because the only benefit you get is the satisfaction you helped out, but they’re not asking for much and they’re nice people.
And with a push of a button, it was gone. Respect. Confidence. Career. It happened so fast that it felt like an out of body experience. Like when Patrick Swayze watched himself get killed in Ghost. I love my Canon D-SLR camera and love how effortless it is to get cinema style footage from it. But there is one drawback to them — digital cards.
I’ve shot a lot of footage with my camera and have gotten used to quickly swapping cards and batteries as it goes through a lot of both. And when you’re on a no-lo budget shoot speed is paramount. Unfortunately, last weekend, quickness and bad habits got the best of me.
After shooting four hours of footage, I went to make a quick battery change, and accidentally formatted my SD card. It was purely instinctual, like I’ve done it a hundred times. For some reason my brain equated swapping a battery with swapping an SD card, and every time I do that I format; a quality I hereby decree as bad!
Well, that’s the bad news. The good news is the director didn’t shoot me, but quickly made a contingency plan. We re-shot the previous four hours in one and a half, while a PA rushed the formatted SD card to a data recovery expert who was actually able to recover all the data. The production was saved despite my attempts to sabotage it (and my career).
The film we shot is for a local theater production called Silent Pictures written by Tommie Trull. The footage is to be used as a flashback / dream sequence of a silent film star. Below is a quick video I edited for myself to get a sense of where I wanted to go with it. The final film is 1920’s style black and white silent film, so I didn’t color correct. I used two songs. The first is Jane Doe by Never Shout Never, and the second song is by Devotchka.
The life of an amateur 