Risa Binder covers Taylor Swift's "RED"

When Risa Binder contacted Spencer to shoot Taylor Swift's single "RED" their goal was to make the music video fun. That's what they did alright. From pillow fights to the elevator schtick behind the couch. "Risa has a bright playful quality making it great to work together. Even the guitarist Oscar Bautista got into the fun with his on camera humor. " says Spencer.

Why did Binder want to cover Taylor Swift's "RED"? Risa states "I wanted to cover her song 'Red' because I've been on the same love roller coaster ride, feeling all the colors she's talking about...especially Red."

Spencer and Risa have worked together before. Making a perfect collaborative team between taking direction and giving direction from both sides of the camera. "I like working with Risa she has creative ideas and is open to taking professional suggestions as well. I am an image solutions specialist taking my client's ideas and bringing it to visual fruition. Many times when Risa and I work on a project I can expand and strengthen her creative idea in a way she did not even imagine." comments Spencer.

The location of the shoot took place at 145 Antiques in Long Island City. A long time client of Gordon's they too have collaborated on many videos. "Jerry and Jim the owners of 145 Antiques have an extensive inventory of exquisite vintage furniture and props. They were so accommodating for Risa's shoot, being conscientious that we were actually recording sound live." Spencer claims.

Binder released her debut album, "Paper Heart," on Warehouse Records in February. The Brooklyn-based musician recorded the set in Nashville with producer Marshall Altman (Ingrid Michaelson, Natasha Bedingfield).

via Risa Binder Covers Taylor Swift's 'Red': Video Premiere - Viral Videos | Billboard.

On My Block Films - Screening Event

Even though we live in a city of over 8 million people, a lot of us don’t even know our neighbors. When you’re not connected to the people living on the other side of the wall, it’s hard to have any sense of belonging within a community. “On My Block” creates an opportunity for neighbors to introduce themselves, work together and create trusting relationships through the collaborative filmmaking process. The films created live on past the festival window as a source for community pride, and as a living map of the world’s most creative city.

OMB encourages novice as well as professional filmmakers to participate. Our goal is to capture a wide spectrum of blocks throughout the five boroughs including those whose residents live in religious centers, senior centers, homeless shelters, coops and even prisons.

Don't miss the OMB Screening on Wednesday, November 14th @ 7PM is at White Wave's John Ryan Theater on 25 Jay Street (entrance on John St.) in DUMBO Brooklyn.

White Wave is located right along the water in DUMBO, Brooklyn. Attendees can take the F Train to the York Street Stop and walk West 3 blocks to John Street where the entrance is. Click here for a map.

White Wave's beautiful hardwood dance studio will be serving as our cozy venue. Beer and Wine will be available by donation and movie concessions (Milk Duds, Goobers, Popcorn, etc...) will also be available for purchase. Dress is casual.

7:00-7:45 Cocktail Hour
7:45-10:00 Screening and Awards Presentation

So mark your calendars and start inviting your neighbors, friends and colleagues for what is sure to be an inspirational and entertaining evening. For more information on White Wave's John Ryan Theater, visit www.whitewavedance.com/category/john-ryan-theater/

Tickets are available now.

Interested in sponsoring the screening to show your community support?

Amazing! Simply contact mary@onmyblockfilms.com

"My Ship" - Nadia Ackerman | Music Video

Nadia Ackerman's song "My Ship" was inspired by a young boy looking out to sea, when asked by his mother "What are looking for?" the young boy commented "I'm waiting for my ship to come in."

We shot this video one rainy afternoon while on tour in Australia. It's amazing how many things lined up perfectly for this video happen.

Here let me list them for you... ready.
1. The weather.
It was June, Australia's winter and usually it's rainy season. But this particular June was one to go on record as one of the highest rainfalls ever! It was drizzling during our shoot, the rain had slowed down just enough to make it tolerable for the boys to stand outside. You'll also notice that the sea was placid barely a ripple in the water. A calmness that gave a sombre feeling to the video. Perfect visually for creating that infinity horizon especially with the bit of fog to help mask the industrial cargo ships not far off shore. By the way Harvey Jones, the synthensizer mastermind in Nadia's band, and I went on a bike ride down to the same area the next day. The sea was raging! 4 foot swells and gail force winds. You would not have believed it was the same beach.

2. The costumes.
Nadia was the artistic director of this video and wanted the boys to wear pirates costumes. We were in Melbourne for only a few days. Doing radio interviews and a gig at The Toff our time was precious. Fortunately the pirate threads arrived on our second to last day.

3. The actors.
Jack and Sam were amazing! You just never know with kids. With Nadia's direction they adhered to her every command. They did manage to give the camera a "rude" finger or two during the playful running around scenes. We all got a good chuckle.

Jack and Sam are brothers very close. Jack, the older brother, has aspergers and the expressions he gave are so genuine we were besides ourselves. While Sam the younger one, who may be the next dance sensation, was an excellent supporting role.

4. The edit.
Due to the weather and the boys attention span we managed to shoot for barely 35mins. Not nearly enough film I thought at the time. I did my best to get as much cut away footage as I could. We got a couple of takes out of the boys for each scene. Nadia who loves to edit did an amazing job piecing the story together. I really wish we had had better weather conditions to get more B footage. Seriously I thought by the time we were done shooting my Nikon P7000 was going to short circuit it was so wet. Regardless Nadia managed to edit what we had to a solid music video.

In hind sight I really would not change a thing about the shoot for this music video. I've learned over the years you can plan and plan and plan a shoot. I was traveling with limited gear for the tour and no assistant. However sometimes you just have to go for it. As I state in my quote at the bottom of my website "Imagine NO excuses... All that is left is the space to create."

More info about
Nadia Ackerman
Harvey Jones

Airline Travel Needs To Change

Traveling by air is usually divided into 3 parts. Waiting, waiting aaaanndd... waiting.

Today I'm traveling to Copenhagen. So about 5 hours before I needed to be at the airport I checked in online with my airline. Cool the flight status is on time.

So now we wait to be picked up to go to the airport. Well low and behold the shuttle van is on time! However there is an hours worth of driving around picking up more passengers so I have to wait some more.

Once at the airport you wait in line to check in, but I just did that online why should I wait to check in? No matter upon checking in the ticket agent informs me that the flight is delayed by an hour. Which equals waiting some more.


Next the security line where you have to wait for your ticket to be checked, wait for more bins to put your stuff in, wait to be told which TSA device they want you to go through. "WAIT sir. Hold your arms out please." A pat down prolongs the waiting I'm about to do in the terminal.

Finally you get to the waiting area at least we know what happens here. Yep. I heard you say it.

Board the plane we wait til we get to our destination. Disembark the plane then we wait for our baggage. Uuuugh.

OHHH wait a second wait in line for a taxi. Get in the taxi and zoom off to your final destination. Damn it!!!! Traffic so we have to wait some more.

As I was standing in line waiting in this whole process a woman said to me "Wouldn't it be great to just wiggle your nose and be where you are going?". "HELL yes!" I said.

Abkraken - A Film Made by Neighbors

Phew!!! We did it! What fun.

Just the other day I blogged about a neighborhood film challenge with On My Block Films. It's been edited and submitted to the filmmaking challenge website and is now live on the On My BLock Vimeo Channel.

Even though I recently blogged about On My Block we had been planning our film for weeks. We had 6 people total involved, 1 dog and 2 businesses. Not quite the level of a Hollywood film production. Lucy Frend who is a unique clothing designer was the "Block Team Leader". She came up the abstract and creative storyline. Watch the film below.

"Abkraken" - Park Avenue / 97th-98th Street from On My Block Films on Vimeo.

My role was Director of Photography. I tackled all the filming technical issues. Like types of cameras we used how to get the look with various lenses and so on. To get the "point of view" look I opted for the Hero Camera. Lucy wore the head strap with the camera mount. I directed her on how to move with the camera on her head to give the best footage. We only used one other camera that was the new Nikon D800. An incredible camera the quality is by far astounding to the other DSLR's I've used for other films.

The editing process I was also involved in giving a tutorial in iMovie. Impressively Lucy was quite inventive using a scrubbing brush on a wood chair to give the sweeping sound of the guy sweeping the sidewalk. He's actually the owner of Guthrie's Inn.

The beauty of this project is NOT having to be a pro filmmaker. It's all about community... getting to know your neighbors. Through this film Lucy meet Kathy who is also from England. I got to be in front of the camera for once I was the bartender. As well as I got to pass on my expertise in filmmaking. We got to know the business owners. Myung of 97th Street Cleaner is an avid dog lover. So am I!!! It's amazing what we find out about one another through a fun project such as making a film.

Are you interested in making a film and getting to know your neighbors? Yea.... go on then.
Register to make a film with On My Block Films just CLICK HERE.

For more information:

On My Block Films Presents - A NEIGHBORHOOD FILMMAKING CHALLENGE.

Calling all non-filmmakers & filmmakers - On My Block Films

Although we live in a city of over 8 million people, a lot of us don’t even know our neighbors. When you’re not connected to the people living on the other side of the wall, it’s hard to have any sense of belonging within a community. “On My Block Films” ( OMB ) creates an opportunity for neighbors to introduce themselves, work together, and create trusting relationships through the collaborative filmmaking process. The films created will live on past the festival window as a source for community pride and as a living map of the world’s most creative city.

OMB encourages novice as well as professional filmmakers to participate. Our goal is to capture a wide spectrum of blocks throughout the five boroughs.
Beginning August 1, all eligible films will be posted and screened online from the time they are finished until November 1, 2012. The public will be able to vote on a film by liking it on Vimeo. The 30 films with the most Vimeo likes will move on to be judged by the Judging Panel the first week of November. The top-scoring 15 films will be screened at a physical outdoor festival in November. Awards will be presented to Best Narrative Film, Best Documentary Film and Best In Show.

I plan on doing a film something abstract and fun. Next door is my Tailor and I know the Bar owner. That's two people right there. Maybe I'll use my Hero camera... yea that sounds good. My creative ideas are flowing. Now I just have to get out there an meet my neighbors. Yea a bit unnerving but hey it will be fun. That's the whole point of the project, have fun and get to know your neighbors. What do have I to lose? Space on my external hard drive that's about it.

Lights, camera, action!!!

How about you? Interested? Of course you are... check out On My Block Films for more details.

Here's the OMB schedule:

Dates: August 1 – OMB will kick off.

August 1 through October 31 – Films will be shot, edited, uploaded to Vimeo.

August 1 through October 31 – Public Voting will be open.

November 6 – Judges Panel will vote.

November 17 – Top 15 films will be screened at On My Block Film Festival.

For more information

On My Block Films Presents - A NEIGHBORHOOD FILMMAKING CHALLENGE.

Circle In The Sand - A documentary film about love, hope and forgiveness.

For the month of June I travelled with Nadia Ackerman, singer / songwriter, and a simplified version of her band ( Harvey Jones and David M Patterson ) on a music tour across Australia. Starting in Sydney Nadia had to overcome many obstacles along the way. Not only was she the tour manager, the marketing coordinator, social media promoter, webmaster, the performer, the songwriter, the financial backer... Nadia was also confronting a 20 year old wound, the loss of her father.

The documentary film Nadia and I are creating is going to cover what it is like for independent music artists to make it in the music industry. As well as bring a personal side of the story about family, relationships, and dealing with the death of a parent.

What we've noticed through the process of making the film that timing is everything. We had some absolutely magical occurrences happen during the course of the trip across Australia. Things we can't explain unless we put a visual to the story.

This documentary film can use your support. I have set up a KickStarter project: Under Going to help fund the film. Yes... this post is quite late in the game. With only 57 hours, just over two days left to reach the funding goal your pledge is imperative to creating this film. July 5th is the deadline to reach the goal. But we are committed to making this film happen. So if you are out at the beach celebrating 4th of July I completely understand, don't forget to apply your sunblock.

Here is the link to support the KickStarter project - Under Going:

http://www.kickstarter.com/projects/spencergordon/under-going-a-healing-process-to-release-the-past