LA Update: Week 8-9

After being off of Facebook for a couple weeks, I got back on and saw that like a bazillion people had made their profile pictures of me and them. I can't tell you how blessed I was to see that. Whoever decided to get everyone together to do this - thank you. You have no idea how timely this was. In the darkest moment of my life I was reminded that I am not forgotten and abandoned. I love you all and thank you for your support and love towards me.

Tuesday, March 8
One of the film groups that I am held a casting session today, in the meantime I have been sound editing for a project which you will see in a little bit on this blog.

Wednesday, March 9
This evening all the sound designers got together so we could watch our sound projects. The assignment was that we were each given a specific clip of an action scene without any sound at all. Without watching the original scene, we had to dissect which sounds we would need and add those in. So every sound that you hear is something that I added in. This is my scene from The Incredibles (I recommend listening to it with good speakers or headphones):


Thursday, March 10
Today in class we got to watch the film that I had acted in over the weekend (last blog)... oh man. :/ (the pic is of me doing some ADR for the film)
My acting was pretty horrendous, but hey, I'm glad I gave it a shot, and maybe someday I'll get to act the part of something I would really love - an awkward character like Michael Scott, or someone in a Jared Hess film.

Friday, March 11
Good news from the skies! Holly is in town! I picked her up at the airport and as tradition goes for visitors, I immediately took her to the holy grail of fast food - In-N-Out. When we got back to the apartment, Jake and I stayed up really late finishing our script, storyboards, and other miscellaneous pre production work for our shoot the next day (not a good idea - get it done ahead of time!)

Saturday, March 12
Spent alllllll day shooting our film. Quite extensive - I think we were working on set for around 15 hours (thankfully that's not exactly legal or necessary with a crew and budget). I got rather upset... elements of my old self trying to rise up. Another late night storyboarding... I feel really bad not being able to hang out with Holly much this weekend, but thankfully she's been having a good time meeting up with friends.

Sunday, March 13
We shot for our film all day again today. My old self started to resurface, getting frustrated with people and decisions, thinking highly of myself, and not focusing on God or others at all. Aaron really put me in check. He asked me if I had been reading the Word, to which I replied "No." "I can tell," he said. BAM - conviction. I realized I was being a total idiot, letting my busyness become an excuse to not spend time with God in the past few days, and it certainly showed. Thankfully God straightened me out.

Thursday, March 17
I drove to Newport to pick up Holly tonight, she's done with her conference and gets to hang out with me for another weekend. (Or at least part of it, unfortunately she came the two weekends in a row when I am shooting for our different films). Here is one of the videos that I have been working on at my internship for a client. I redesigned the logo, modeled it in C4D, created all of the sky elements - clouds, lightning, etc, and animated them. It was awesome to be given the opportunity to have such a big part of a project.

Brain Hero from Center on the Developing Child on Vimeo.

Also, we just put up our brand new website for Psychic Bunny (my internship)




Friday, March 18
I went to work early today so that I could get out early.
Holly went with me so she could see my work, and meet some of my coworkers and then she got to hang out at Ikea while I was at work. I got done really early in the afternoon and so Holly and I went shopping. I have two "Believe it or Don't!" moments of the day. First - I actually bought an article of clothing - I got this yellow V-neck for $6! Second - the men's section at the H&M that I went to actually looked like the clothing was for men! Anyways, Holly and I had a great time shopping on Sunset Blvd and then I took her to the tourist area - the infamous Hollywood and Highland, so that she could see the stars, Kodak theater, handprints, Chinese theater, etc. That night she and I drove to Laguna Beach and had a great dinner there with our wonderful friend Michael and his girlfriend Jess. After dinner we got to walk around on the beach and have a great talk about how if the nuclear reactors in Japan blow up, everyone west of Utah will die in three months. It was nice hanging out with them, espesh since I haven't seen Michael since like the second week I was at school.

Saturday, March 19
We shot most of the day today for our big short film (the one that we spend all semester on and have a whole budget and crew for). When I got done, Holly, Anson and I, went to the store to get some groceries to make dinner with and then we made an amazing manicotti. Then we watched a sweet ski movie that Holly brought. I MISS THE SNOW!!!! Someday I will live by a ski resort again and I will snowboard every weekend! ....well hopefully. Speaking of snow. There is this new band I found thanks to Pandora, and they are freaking awesome - Miike Snow. (Some of their songs don't have very wholesome lyrics so skip those, but this song here is sweet).

We then went to Yogurtland and then walked around the museums.

Sunday, March 20
Because of this giant marathon thing in Hollywood, church was cancelled today, so I finally got a morning to sleep in. I took holly to airport and then returned for my last day of filming. We got done around 11, and then I took some much needed time to worship and blog. It was sad to see Holly go, but I was so blessed to have her come visit. She really is the best sister ever (she even cleaned up our kitchen!) It's also just nice to have the company of family when you're having a tough time.



Well life has been quite the trip. I am walking through the valley of the shadow of death in my life, but God has been my shepherd, leading me through it. As much as I loved my past four years at Evangel, it is nearly impossible to recall my memory of it without pain. It is now interwoven with so much hurt. I don't know how I'll ever be able to look back on it the same. But I praise God for the work he is doing through this time. I am learning so much, I am knowing Him so much more, I am surrendering all to Him, and I am dependent on him.
For the first time in my life, I am really beginning to understand joy. What is joy? It supersedes all that we know as happiness. Happiness is shallow, happiness is temporary, happiness is fleeting, happiness is an emotion, here for a moment and gone the next. But joy lives on. I have found joy in Christ. It's an interesting concept, so opposite of what our humanity teaches us. People ask me how I'm doing and it's hard to know what to say. Obviously life really sucks and I'm full of pain but I'm good, because my hope is in Christ, because he is my strength and I find joy and hope in knowing him and knowing that he is always with me. Happiness cannot survive through trial and suffering, but joy lives on through everything. It's awesome to finally be able to grasp a piece of that.