Learning the craft - writing, film, etc.

Lately, I've been watching YouTube videos.

I started out of people sending me the most hilarious stuff. The humor lead to music, the music to individual players, that to how to videos, mostly blues guitar work. That lead to running into some documentary type footage, mostly raw footage of famous people from my past. That lead to actual documentary footage. Mostly in this case, of one shots of famous people being interviewed. Like the AFI documents.

This started with my watching all the videos I could find on speculative fiction writer, Harlan Ellison. He was a hero of mind as a child, reading his works, seeing things he'd worked on in TV shows.

That lead more recently to my discovering a set of Rod Serling videos, his talking to students. ROD SERLING!

This week, I discovered the AFI videos of Mike Douglas, Jerry Lewis, Dick Van Dyke, William Shatner. I watched these because they were immediately available. But I plan to look into others now.

Just go to YouTube and type whomever you like, in the search field, then search through the available videos on them. Look for those that have parts, 1, 2, 3, etc.

This are fascinating video documents. They give a history of Hollywood, or writing, or whatever you are interested in basically.

We need to learn constantly. If you want to be a writer, a filmmaker, whatever, you need to learn on your own. School is good, its great; on the job work, is greater; but you always have to take it upon yourself to continue your studies, where ever you can find them. On the internet, in a book, on TV, in a coffeeshop. Anywhere. Everywhere.

My grandmother once told me to always surround yourself with intelligent, notable people and you will become notable yourself, in one away or another, depending on what it is you want out of life. This has always been good advice to me, and I pass it on to you. Whatever you want to be, find those people, and "Be" with them, as much as is reasonable (don't be a stalker).

So if you find yourself watching silly, or entertaining videos on YouTube, try educating yourself a little. Track down some videos of your own heroes. You might learn something useful.