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How to Bury Your Creative Demons in the Desert

13/6/2015

2 Comments

 
Photo collage - Almería desert, barred window, thumbs up with the words Blast Your Creative Blocks

One morning, early in the editing period of my film, I arrived at college to find that the film room had burnt down.

My footage was in it.

​Goodbye film number one.

​My college relationship with video began promisingly. My first film combined stills and video in a psychedelic short: The protagonists entered a Seargent Pepper-like multicoloured world via a C.S. Lewis wardrobe. Yes, I always liked to mix my metaphors. (And my stimulants.)
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I loved doing the storyboard. I enthused my spikey-haired flatmates into taking part in the shoot. It was the project I had most enjoyed since starting the Theatre Design course.
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Beware of Bandits and Random Acts of Peril

The fire took me totally by surprise. 

I didn't have any back ups of the film footage.

The universe was probably trying to give me a lesson on back-up's but I didn't listen.

In my final year, I tempted the film fates once again. I hooked up with a musician friend from Mozambique to make a music video for a song he'd written.  

I can't remember much about the video except that that the cameraman was high and we co-opted a bunch of multi-ethnic kids to dance in a circle. So embarrassing to think of now. Probably just as well the musician ran off back to Mozambique with the only copy of the video. 

I didn't see it that way at the time though. He went right before the end of the final college term, leaving me now minus two projects to present for my degree.
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The Good, the Bad, and the Ugly Demons

You can imagine it's been a big psychological challenge to work with film again. But hey ho, third time lucky and all that. I've got to bury that video demon sometime.

​So last weekend I was on location in Almería - Europe's only desert where many Spaghetti Westerns were made. I went to shoot footage for an online course version of my book, Blast Your Creative Blocks.


So far, so good. The video has arrived home safe and sound and has been copied to my hard drive and iCloud. I'll be putting it on my back up drive and Google Drive as well just to make sure.

(Thank you Universe, I did finally learn!)

Barring alien intervention or a world-devastating, Mercury-retrograde-induced cataclysm, it should be safe.
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Bury some of your own Creative Demons!


​We don't always have time to take a trip to the desert to face our ugliest demons. Sometimes, we need to be quicker on the draw! 

Get a FREE copy of my Quick Unblocking Workbook to get you back on the creative trail speedier than the fastest shooter in the west!

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copyright: Cherry Jeffs 2013-2021



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2 Comments
Nela link
18/6/2015 07:41:48 am

Wow, that's a bummer, to lose your footage not once but twice!

I can see how that might have created a block to doing video again. I'm so glad to hear you've got it sorted, and of course learned your lesson so now you know how to prevent future disasters.

Wow my geography knowledge is so bad, I had no idea there was a desert in Spain. Fascinating!

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Cherry Jeffs link
18/6/2015 08:02:54 am

Yes, it was a bit unfair but, who knows, had it all gone according to plan my life might have gone in a completely different direction and I like it the way it is :)
Although it's called a desert, Nela, it isn't miles of swirling sand as you might imagine, it's scrub with virtually no rainfall.

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