Friday, January 27th, 2012 -
Kind of a funny title, I suppose.
I’m going to pen just a few lines of thought on this Friday afternoon from my corner of world. I had planned to make the trek up to Utah this week to be a part of the 11th annual LDS Film Festival. The Lord had other plans for me. I won’t go into details, but in years past where I had felt very good about volunteering with the film festival, that’s not the case this year. (more…)
Thursday, January 12th, 2012 -
Today I announced the open registration for a new LDS-themed filmmaking marthon, Sun Swing Blitz. This idea has been several months in the making and had evolved from the idea of a film festival to a very content specific campaign to produce the remainder of the stories that I had rights to produce from the Friend magazine. To invite other participants on board required a degree of divestment from the project, and an ever greater degree of humility. At the same time, the thought that there would be other working on these projects is exciting. Full details can be found on the production blitz pages.
If you’ve got the time and any inclination towards filmmaking, I’d warmly encourage you to consider your involvement in first Sun Swing Blitz.
Monday, December 26th, 2011 -
Recently we pushed live a new page discussing our focus on LDS Kids videos and family entertainment. Our reason for doing so was purely strategic, but it also allowed us to turn our attentions to those terms that people could be using to find more information about our project. In other words, I’ve kind of been shying away from branding our animated series of stories from The Friend magazine as being “LDS Kids Videos,” but at the end of the day, we realized that we were not giving people the information that they needed to find these videos online. (more…)
Wednesday, October 26th, 2011 -
The time is at hand for me to start work on yet another exciting chapter in the evolving purpose for the Sun Swing Media Company. I suppose for a company of one (two if I count my wife) official announcements aren’t much of a big to-do, so there’s not really any fear of letting the cat out of the bag prematurely, so to speak.
Yet, before I jump to the “big” news, here is the reason for it. It has been brought to my attention, on several occasions, how the true stories of Mormonism are actually the continuation of the work of Christ in our day. What is most interesting about the bulk of Christian and even a fair amount of LDS media is that, and especial for children, we are only telling the stories of Christ anciently, those that are taken from the Scriptures. Now that’s all fine and good, but there is a reality of which as LDS media producers that we must come to appreciate.
Starting with Joseph Smith, who did the best with what established Christianity had given him, and then had God the Father and His Son appear to him, the opening of a new canon of living scripture began to be written more abundantly. In reality, only the doctrines and the covenants associated with that “scripture” have been recorded and officially canonized. The stories have not been committed to scripture in our day, except for the very beginning of Joseph Smith’s work as a prophet. But the stories of the rise and spread of the work of Christ in our day are here and they are here in abundance.
It is not my purpose here to elaborate in greater detail at this moment in time about the stories, these true stories of Christ’s modern ministry. Yet, it is the recognition that there are so very few of such stories being told, that has promoted me to organize a film festival dedicated exclusively to the story telling of the work of Christ in our day, with all its attended suffering, hardship, dedication, work, and rejoicing.
Without having worked out details of any venue or other logistics, of which I know there is much to do, I am beginning work on the development of an online and local film/media festival in Phoenix metropolitan area. To stay abreast of the latest details, like “Sun Swing” on Facebook or sign up for our email newsletter. Our Facebook page is setup to receive our latest blog updates. You can also subscribe to the RSS feed for the site directly located at the top or bottom of any page on the site.
Why? Because the sun is rising.
Monday, October 10th, 2011 -
So if you’ve come to this page, you’re probably like me: looking for some where to watch 17 Miracles as a download or online, maybe you even want to do it for free. (Well, perhaps I should chide you ever so mildly for wanting to watch it for free, especially when we’re otherwise very willing to plop down $10 for less-than-worthy entertainment elsewhere. But that’s not my point in posting this article.) This is something of an experiment to see how much web traffic I can drive to a single post about the movie 17 Miracles being available for download online. Which as far as I am aware, it is not available legitimately online anywhere for download. (more…)
Wednesday, September 28th, 2011 -
Please forgive me. This post is mostly a personal note to myself as I work to keep myself afloat and facing the right direction, towards Zion. I’ve experienced a great deal of stress as of late related to my personal finances. To be sure, this is not a lucrative venture. In fact, I’m skipping along the bottom of the barrel. These are tight times. But in all honesty, I’ve never had an abundance of income, and it would probably surprise most people that with the burden of feeding a family of five children, we get along quite well living below the national poverty level.
So what does this have to do with producing movies in Zion? (more…)
Friday, August 26th, 2011 -
Attention Bloggers:
We need your help! The Sun Swing Media Company is working hard to produce a new series of animated cartoons from the Friend magazine, a children’s publication from the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, and has received permission to produce these videos. The first video, “The Decision,” has already been completed. Two more stories are ready for production. The hope is to eventually produce a series of 30 short movies before we’re done. (more…)
Tuesday, August 23rd, 2011 -
So about a week ago, I posted a YouTube video of Mark Thompson, the BBC Director General, offering remarks to Coventry University on the question of moral media, and whether the bulk of the content of the BBC was moral or not. While I cannot go into a detailed review of Mr. Thompson’s remarks, there are two points that I wish to address, one I agree very strongly with, and the other I half agree with. (more…)
Friday, August 12th, 2011 -
Concept Art for "The Valentine"
Just this afternoon, I received permission to add “The Valentine” a delightful look into an old Valentine’s Day tradition from the early 1900′s. I’m so excited about this one that I’m almost hoping that it bring the tradition back to life. As the story goes, it was customary back in the day to drop a Valentine’s card at someone’s house, kick their door and run, so that the giver of the Valentine remained anonymous. There’s an expected twist to this story though when the recipient of the Valentine in this story is neighbor kid who is developmentally disabled. I’m not exactly sure how soon we’ll get to produce this one, but I am going to push to have it done before Valentine’s Day next year.
Tuesday, August 2nd, 2011 -
I sat in the board room of the SCERA Theater in Orem as a part of the volunteer staff for the LDS Film Festival which was underway. In walked two representatives for the LDS Church’s audio/visual department to speak with other filmmakers present, acting as recruits for their burgeoning video projects. After a lengthy discussion, they then turned to me and asked, “And what do you do?” (more…)