I came in pretty late to the cell phone game... I was so against getting a cell phone that I opted to get a pager in 2003 (yes they still made pagers). 6 months after getting a pager I finally took the plunge and got a real cell phone with a real cell phone plan.
I have had the same phone number since 2002 - 7 years, which is like 48 in people years.
Two months before I got married in 2004, I added my fiance to my cell phone plan - this was Jenn's first real cell phone plan too.
A cell phone is a tether for me... always keeping people connected with them... Just a phone call away. I have over 100 names in my phone book, so when a number shows up without a name, I automatically assume that it is someone calling for me to do a lighting gig (for money which is awesome). I used to get gitty when the phone rings and I don't recognize the number.
Now I have a texting plan... I got a texting plan because I wanted to start twittering - I assume that my life is interesting enough for people to want to know that I am watching an episode of "my so called life" or at a thrift store....
The problem with texting is its instant gratification for the person on the other side of the phone... now you can request lighting from me without a hello, how are you doing, etc....
This sucks...
For these reasons:
A. I run a little lighting company with just under $10,000 in gear....
B. I have right around 15 years of technical experience doing lighting/sound/video....
C. I am a Christian
D. I am a nice guy
E. I am horrible at business/money stuff
Here is the problem....
I get texts or calls from people that know about A/B and want it on the cheap or free and then play the cards from items C/D, then I (acting on item E) say/text yes in response.
I have seriously got a little under 10 texts/calls/messages wanting items A/B for little to no money using item C and D as bargaining chip...
Now my phone is stupid and I now cringe when my phone lights up with a voice mail or text message. It doesn't just happen during "normal business hours" it happens at night, on the weekends, when I am on dates, or with my family..... I can't shut off my phone because I am afraid I am going to lose money.
Money doesn't bother me, no I was just joking, money really bothers me, stresses me out, and honestly causes a lot of heartache...
I have one ministry that has owed me money for two months
I have a check from a client that is a week old that I can't cash
I get calls from folks wanting free consultations for their trendy churches
I get texts from people that want gear for cheap, debate me on the price and use the ministy card as an exuse for not having money.
I currently have $1.50 in the bank.
The past few weeks have sucked for me and my little business... I did three gigs...
1 - was fun but a lot of work
2 - paid but it sucked working with the client
3 - was a lot more work and no cash yet....
on top of that, my phone is blowing up with people wanting me to use my experience or my inventory for free/cheap.
I digress.....
I love doing lighting work...
I love my cool church job but sometimes I can't sleep at night because of my cool church job....
I gave "Genesis Productions" 10 years of my life.... I am ready to kill it... sell the gear and call it quits.... but I can't...... cause I have $1.50 in the bank.... I now HAVE to do the stupid gigs because I need the money...... Don't get me wrong.... I love getting paid to do lighting stuff...
But its getting harder and less fun... I think its a tragedy. I want my phone to ring with people wanting me and my gear and want to pay real money.
I just don't have that now...
at this point in my life I wanted 2/3 of my income to come from my lighting business... now 2/3 of my stress comes from my lighting company.
I want to be able to concentrate on my family, my church job, and nice freelance work.
Get rid of my current cell phone number.... and start over.
that is where I am at right now.
9.05.2009
5.29.2009
Feeling like I am missing out on things.
My son Nathan turned two recently - he is growing more and more independent as times go on. He is aware that there is a new baby here and probably still doesn't know what to think of it.
Nathan sometimes gets in these horrible emotional moods complete with temper tantrums, screaming, throwing stuff etc...
Then he will turn around and be the sweetest, funnest kid ever. I believe that he is going to be the coolest kid ever.
Just today - I had Brandon, Maggie, and John over today - they wanted to bust out the old Nintendo and play a few games.... Well like most nintendo games you have to blow in it to make the game work. Nathan saw Brandon blow in a game a few times - then picked up another Nintendo Cartridge and began blowing into the game.... that is how cool my son is....
Believe it or not - I do work a lot - between work at the church, side work, etc I find myself getting busier and busier. Nathan will catch me getting ready to go to work/a gig and yell "Car Seat" - which is Nathan's way of telling me that he wants to go with me. Sometimes when I leave the house to go do a gig the last thing I see is Nathan looking at me through the glass in our front door.
and it kills me every time.
I wonder what is he thinking at that moment?
Where is daddy going? Why is he leaving me? When is he coming back? Am I really that unimportant?
I know that little kids emotions are less complex then grown ups but it does make you wonder.
I have to work to make things happen - I love my work - I love what I do - I strongly believe that God has me here to do the tech work that I do everyday at New Life, random churches, venues, etc...
Sometimes I hate leaving the house to do the things that I love doing. The questions that are running through my mind as I am departing from the coldesack that we live on is:
Where am I going? Why am I leaving my family again? When will I see them again? Do they know that they are important to me?
Nathan sometimes gets in these horrible emotional moods complete with temper tantrums, screaming, throwing stuff etc...
Then he will turn around and be the sweetest, funnest kid ever. I believe that he is going to be the coolest kid ever.
Just today - I had Brandon, Maggie, and John over today - they wanted to bust out the old Nintendo and play a few games.... Well like most nintendo games you have to blow in it to make the game work. Nathan saw Brandon blow in a game a few times - then picked up another Nintendo Cartridge and began blowing into the game.... that is how cool my son is....
Believe it or not - I do work a lot - between work at the church, side work, etc I find myself getting busier and busier. Nathan will catch me getting ready to go to work/a gig and yell "Car Seat" - which is Nathan's way of telling me that he wants to go with me. Sometimes when I leave the house to go do a gig the last thing I see is Nathan looking at me through the glass in our front door.
and it kills me every time.
I wonder what is he thinking at that moment?
Where is daddy going? Why is he leaving me? When is he coming back? Am I really that unimportant?
I know that little kids emotions are less complex then grown ups but it does make you wonder.
I have to work to make things happen - I love my work - I love what I do - I strongly believe that God has me here to do the tech work that I do everyday at New Life, random churches, venues, etc...
Sometimes I hate leaving the house to do the things that I love doing. The questions that are running through my mind as I am departing from the coldesack that we live on is:
Where am I going? Why am I leaving my family again? When will I see them again? Do they know that they are important to me?
5.02.2009
Hey blog reader(s)
I have lots of cool stuff to talk about.... Then I get lazy and waste time on facebook...
Some personal stuff going on:
>Garrett Newton Tucker - my second son
>really enjoying my job at new life
>wife=awesome
Lighting related stuff I've been meaning to write about:
>the Russian game show gig.
>the new stage set for Night Church
>Demo-ing Pro Presenter at our church
>Catalyst (an event for providence school)
>I just bought a Radiance Hazer
>The 1 watt LED vs 500 watt par can shootout
>Switching cameras for the first time for a big youth event
>My new dedicated chamsys computer
(pick one and I will double my efforts to getting around and writing about one....)
Some personal stuff going on:
>Garrett Newton Tucker - my second son
>really enjoying my job at new life
>wife=awesome
Lighting related stuff I've been meaning to write about:
>the Russian game show gig.
>the new stage set for Night Church
>Demo-ing Pro Presenter at our church
>Catalyst (an event for providence school)
>I just bought a Radiance Hazer
>The 1 watt LED vs 500 watt par can shootout
>Switching cameras for the first time for a big youth event
>My new dedicated chamsys computer
(pick one and I will double my efforts to getting around and writing about one....)
2.27.2009
Married for 4 Years
February 26 marked me and Jenn's four year anniversary....
On Thursday I was in a rehearsal for most of the day, Jennifer was at the hosptial with one of her doula clients....
To commerate four years of Marriage I will give you this link. (Scroll down to the fourth entry...)
On Thursday I was in a rehearsal for most of the day, Jennifer was at the hosptial with one of her doula clients....
To commerate four years of Marriage I will give you this link. (Scroll down to the fourth entry...)
2.07.2009
Magazines....and Church
Yeah, magazines....
I get a free subscription to Church Production Magazine - this is one of those ad based free magazines with a few articles thrown in there... basically it highlights mega churches that spent piles of money on their a/v systems or products that are too expensive or irrelevant for 90% of the churches in America... It sounds stupid - I get it for the pictures... Every once in a while they will show a cool stage set that looks achievable and inspiring (oddly enough in a design firm or video company ad not in an actual article). So for free its a good magazine - its a little stupid sometimes - but its free..
I got a free copy of Collide magazine at LDI last year... It was amazing - it was the perfect mix between church production magazine (without all the megachurch hype) and Relevant magazine (with cool music/movie reviews without Derek Webb on the cover every month)...
A few things that sold me on the magazine:
>an article on putting together a projection system for new churches using a $500 projector, a copy of powerpoint, and an old computer... How cool is that - had that article been in church production magazine, you would of least spent $5000 on a projector, a $2000 seamless scaler, and a $400 copy of easy worship or someting.
>Good reviews of Christmas media (the magazine is targeted to church media folks)
>A writeup about effective use of movies and such during worship.
I got a real subscription and spent real money to get the magazine every other month.
Well, as time went on the magazine focused less on production related articles (projection, lighting, etc) and more on graphics, social networking, and an incredible focus on online/satellite churches.
Which is cool - but it doesn't pertain to me - I don't have a desire to go to a church and watch a preacher on a projection screen 1000 miles away and my internet connection is so slow that I can barely stream my churches service.
There was also a lot of complaining about the church.... The pinnacle of this is when they interviewed Derek Webb for their magazine... I like Derek Webb's music... I ran lights for him several times at Murray Hill - I just don't like it when people have a almost hate for the church....
There are a lot of screwed up churches in America - I know - I was a member of several.... What pisses me off is when folks complain and discourage others about their views of how they do church. Those folks leave their church and get with more pissed off people and plant another church 15 miles away from where they actually live... I have 10 or so churches within a mile of my neighborhood - most of them are dying out - you wouldn't even call them contemporary or youthful. There isn't anyone under the age of 40 attending...
All the cooler/hipper churches are miles away in cooler/richer parts of town... I am not making this up...
Why is it that church plants only get planted in rich parts of town...
Moreover - why plant a church in a city with 1000 established churches and at least 100 portable church plants?
Why do only rich white attractive folks go to these newer churches? Where are the lower class ugly people going?
Why not get all your plant friends together and go to one of these struggling churches within a community and make it not crappy?
I want to go to cool conferences and hangout with other cool church media folks from around the country... But if they all think that traditional (not online, not a satellite, not portable) church sucks, then I don't want to be around them or their conference because I am going to want to punch them all, grab their iPhones, iBooks, and any other pretentious Apple product and throw it in the nearest body of water.
There are a lot of messed up churches that do suck (leadership problems, stupid conregation members, drama) - but good churches do exist.
Back to magazines... I didn't renew my subscription to Collide - I had hopes on it becoming something cooler. Maybe next year.
Where the trendy churches get an "A" for effort in things like the Starbucks coffee in the church cafe, which music they are doing from the Hillsong library, knowing what current movie/top 40's music references to use during the sermon, or the designer clothes the people on stage wear.... My church gets a definite "A" for effort for drawing people closer to God, changing folks lives, and reaching a wide range of demographics is where my church gets an "A" for effort in what they do....
...and achieve.
I get a free subscription to Church Production Magazine - this is one of those ad based free magazines with a few articles thrown in there... basically it highlights mega churches that spent piles of money on their a/v systems or products that are too expensive or irrelevant for 90% of the churches in America... It sounds stupid - I get it for the pictures... Every once in a while they will show a cool stage set that looks achievable and inspiring (oddly enough in a design firm or video company ad not in an actual article). So for free its a good magazine - its a little stupid sometimes - but its free..
I got a free copy of Collide magazine at LDI last year... It was amazing - it was the perfect mix between church production magazine (without all the megachurch hype) and Relevant magazine (with cool music/movie reviews without Derek Webb on the cover every month)...
A few things that sold me on the magazine:
>an article on putting together a projection system for new churches using a $500 projector, a copy of powerpoint, and an old computer... How cool is that - had that article been in church production magazine, you would of least spent $5000 on a projector, a $2000 seamless scaler, and a $400 copy of easy worship or someting.
>Good reviews of Christmas media (the magazine is targeted to church media folks)
>A writeup about effective use of movies and such during worship.
I got a real subscription and spent real money to get the magazine every other month.
Well, as time went on the magazine focused less on production related articles (projection, lighting, etc) and more on graphics, social networking, and an incredible focus on online/satellite churches.
Which is cool - but it doesn't pertain to me - I don't have a desire to go to a church and watch a preacher on a projection screen 1000 miles away and my internet connection is so slow that I can barely stream my churches service.
There was also a lot of complaining about the church.... The pinnacle of this is when they interviewed Derek Webb for their magazine... I like Derek Webb's music... I ran lights for him several times at Murray Hill - I just don't like it when people have a almost hate for the church....
There are a lot of screwed up churches in America - I know - I was a member of several.... What pisses me off is when folks complain and discourage others about their views of how they do church. Those folks leave their church and get with more pissed off people and plant another church 15 miles away from where they actually live... I have 10 or so churches within a mile of my neighborhood - most of them are dying out - you wouldn't even call them contemporary or youthful. There isn't anyone under the age of 40 attending...
All the cooler/hipper churches are miles away in cooler/richer parts of town... I am not making this up...
Why is it that church plants only get planted in rich parts of town...
Moreover - why plant a church in a city with 1000 established churches and at least 100 portable church plants?
Why do only rich white attractive folks go to these newer churches? Where are the lower class ugly people going?
Why not get all your plant friends together and go to one of these struggling churches within a community and make it not crappy?
I want to go to cool conferences and hangout with other cool church media folks from around the country... But if they all think that traditional (not online, not a satellite, not portable) church sucks, then I don't want to be around them or their conference because I am going to want to punch them all, grab their iPhones, iBooks, and any other pretentious Apple product and throw it in the nearest body of water.
There are a lot of messed up churches that do suck (leadership problems, stupid conregation members, drama) - but good churches do exist.
Back to magazines... I didn't renew my subscription to Collide - I had hopes on it becoming something cooler. Maybe next year.
Where the trendy churches get an "A" for effort in things like the Starbucks coffee in the church cafe, which music they are doing from the Hillsong library, knowing what current movie/top 40's music references to use during the sermon, or the designer clothes the people on stage wear.... My church gets a definite "A" for effort for drawing people closer to God, changing folks lives, and reaching a wide range of demographics is where my church gets an "A" for effort in what they do....
...and achieve.
2.02.2009
Sorry guys...
I haven't posted in a while.... I've been too busy watching Scrubs on DVD and watching the Office on Hulu...
A few cool thingscoming up
>Today (tuesday) - we are watching Ernest Goes to Camp @ Murray Hill Theater
>Friday - youthquake live again at Evangel Temple
>Saturday - I am lighting a game show at a church - No I am not making that up.
>Monday - meet with a youth pastor at Zaxby's about planning his first big youth service
>Tuesday(ish) - work on TV ligthing at a russian speaking church
March - hopefully lighting up two press conferences
Another Zepheniah show
Youthquake
A few cool thingscoming up
>Today (tuesday) - we are watching Ernest Goes to Camp @ Murray Hill Theater
>Friday - youthquake live again at Evangel Temple
>Saturday - I am lighting a game show at a church - No I am not making that up.
>Monday - meet with a youth pastor at Zaxby's about planning his first big youth service
>Tuesday(ish) - work on TV ligthing at a russian speaking church
March - hopefully lighting up two press conferences
Another Zepheniah show
Youthquake
1.24.2009
Zephaniah Tabernacle Concert
Another awesome gig.
Zephaniah Tabernacle (I had to google it to get the spelling correct) is a church in Springfield about a mile from the house Jenn and I used to live in on Laura Street....
This was their first "worship concert" with their new band/praise team and a live recording. We setup the night before at midnight, right after tearing down from youthquake the night before.
Before:
After:
Before:
After:
All in all it was a good show.
The majority of the effect lighting came from 4 10' truss uprights with a Trackspot and a pair of LED 64's mounted on top. 8 Pars on a pair of tripods provided basic front light.
The back truss lights were ran by Chamsys on Andrew's laptop. I am still amazed at what you can do with the software and a USB>DMX box.
Here is a video of the band (and conregation) having a party between songs:
More pictures can be found on the good ole photobucket There were three cameras shooting the event for a promo video, when I get the DVD (and figure out how to rip DVD's) I will post the video for my MANY readers.
This is one of the ONLY shows in 10 years of lighting at various churches where the pastors invited me to come pray with the band back stage
I found this door sign - maybe I'll add "minister of education" to my resume and enclose this picture to prove it:
Believe it or not, I saw my second gold church chair less than 24 hours after seeing the first one at Paxon
Zephaniah Tabernacle (I had to google it to get the spelling correct) is a church in Springfield about a mile from the house Jenn and I used to live in on Laura Street....
This was their first "worship concert" with their new band/praise team and a live recording. We setup the night before at midnight, right after tearing down from youthquake the night before.
Before:
After:
Before:
After:
All in all it was a good show.
The majority of the effect lighting came from 4 10' truss uprights with a Trackspot and a pair of LED 64's mounted on top. 8 Pars on a pair of tripods provided basic front light.
The back truss lights were ran by Chamsys on Andrew's laptop. I am still amazed at what you can do with the software and a USB>DMX box.
Here is a video of the band (and conregation) having a party between songs:
More pictures can be found on the good ole photobucket There were three cameras shooting the event for a promo video, when I get the DVD (and figure out how to rip DVD's) I will post the video for my MANY readers.
This is one of the ONLY shows in 10 years of lighting at various churches where the pastors invited me to come pray with the band back stage
I found this door sign - maybe I'll add "minister of education" to my resume and enclose this picture to prove it:
Believe it or not, I saw my second gold church chair less than 24 hours after seeing the first one at Paxon
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