What a whirlwind!

I’m a bit late to the punch again but as you all know, Hak5 signed an agreement with Revision 3 networks.  You can find the press release here.  This is huge for us, and lets us focus our efforts on getting the show made without having to worry about marketing or distribution.  We film, send the footage to Rev3, who then does their thing with it, and releases it for us.  The first episode will be September 8th, at midnight, followed by the second episode 2 days later on September 10th, at noon.  From then on, every single week there will be a new Hak5 show, always at noon on Wednesday.

I guess a benefit of not getting around to writing that until now is that we filmed 401 and 402 yesterday and already I can see the benefit of having Rev3 onboard with us.  Filming 2 episodes in one day seemed daunting, and initially was, but mainly because we hadn’t filmed an entire show in many months, so we had to spray a little WD40 and work out some kinks.  Once that was done, we were able to start rocking and rolling, and the technolust was strong.  Yesterday’s experience tells me that within a month or two, we will be so comfortable in creating the shows, that not only should we be able to complete our shooting faster, but everyone involved will be very comfortable with one another, and it will show when we throw back and forth to each set.

One problem with the way things were done before, was that we were trying to shoot a good hour or more of stuff one weekend a month.  This, along with some procrastination, had us waiting until the weekend before the 5th each month to shoot everything and edit it to get it out the door.  You would think that switching to a weekly release format would be too much for us to handle, but the opposite is true, and here’s why:

• Totally redesigned set:  There are now 3 different sets in the house.  The “China” set in the corner, the “main” set on the same wall the monolith used to be, and then the “side” set (I apologize if I don’t know the official names for these sets, it just isn’t something my brain cares to remember) which is usually where I will be, along with any guests we have.
• Segment schedule, calendar, and scratchpad.  We now have dedicated documents that we can all go in and edit that have the segment listing for all of the upcoming shoots, who is doing what, how long their segment is roughly going to be, along with notes, links, and all that good stuff.  We had a mailing list before, but this time we’re serious about it and everyone is participating and communicating much more effectively.
• Experience:  Darren, Matt, Paul are the seasoned warriors of this trade and it really helps.  I’m inching along and getting better, and I think it showed last night when I did my segment.  I was the most comfortable in front of the camera than I had ever been before.  Standing in with Matt on his segment was still something I need to get better at though, in terms of asking questions and taking charge of the flow, as a “watson” seems to have to do.  Christine and Shannon are picking this stuff up extremely well, and probably have a better camera presence than I do, of course they’re social creatures.

I’m very much looking forward to these next 2 years.  There is a TON of good content lined up, and we’re eager to show it to all of you!