Evacuate the Dance Floor

Do you remember when amateur music videos were all the rage on YouTube? I'm not talking about the cool parody songs, or horribly done official music videos. No, I'm talking about when a group of kids would pick a song (probably angst ridden) and lip sync along while filming the whole thing in their backyard. You know, the Dark Days.

Well, I may have... dabbled in that genre. Just a bit, and I never posted it anywhere. Okay, so I put it up on Facebook, but I deleted it so no worries right? It took me over 6 years to delete the monstrosity, but it's gone now and there are no existing copies of it. We are safe.

That's right, I was an amateur music video director. I picked 'Evacuate the Dance Floor' by Cascada and rounded up all of my closest friends to film what would become possibly the most amazing thing to come out of my middle school career. Well, other than the video project that almost got me expelled.

My closest friends turned out to be a group of people who could tolerate me enough to meet me at the playground after school. We donned ridiculous hats including a block of foam cheese and Darth Vader's mask. There weren't any smart phones at the time, so we played the song on repeat using my iPod touch and danced like we didn't know how. In my case, I really didn't know how, I still don't.

I had planned it all ahead of time, lyric by lyric, including a moment where we all roll down the hill for no reason other than what the heck else were we supposed to do during instrumental? Of course, we didn't finish filming that day, and scheduling more time to hangout when you're that age is more pain than it's worth. Therefore, I moved on to a different group of friends to help me complete the project.

That's right, half way through the video, the entire cast (minus myself) changed. Continuity everybody. 

Eventually the filming bit was done, and I was ready to move on to editing. I logged on to my family computer and opened Windows Movie Maker. I can hear all of you cringing. It was through this program that I learned what cutting together shots even meant and boy did that clear up a lot. Years of running from behind the camera and ending the video by awkwardly turning it off from the front, all for naught.

This video was horrible, but equally amazing. It was my first time putting something out there for people, despite all my misgivings. I had taken one of many first steps in my path to figuring out what I wanted to do with my future. I've changed my mind many times, travelling all over the job spectrum, but I've always come back to those early videos, the ones that lacked in quality but made up for it with personality.

So cheers to putting yourself out there, to taking the first step, and to finding a path worth following!