Punk Rock and Tofu

A few years ago I happened upon a Craigslist posting looking for an editor in Brooklyn who used Final Cut Pro to edit an episode of a punk rock-themed vegan cooking show. Well, I was vegetarian, I lived in Brooklyn, I used Final Cut Pro, and I'm more than a little familiar with the punk rock.

So I called.

And thus began a four month long disaster.

I had just moved to New York and this was my first editing gig here. In fact, it was really my first editing gig anywhere. Aside from my own films and videos (which were numerous) I didn't have much experience. I was just learning FCP. I'm still learning, in fact.

So it was a trial by error sort of deal. I was paid $100 for the episode. I figured it would take me a few weeks to finesse. However, my computer decided to crash, and I had to replace the hard-drive. Then my mini-DV cam, which I was using as a capture deck, didn't want to be left out and went on the fritz as well. I had to replace the camera's motherboard.

Eventually I had a pretty wobbly rough cut. They had grown tired of the delays and sent an actual editor friend of theirs to rescue the footage. I pretty much lost touch with them after they got the footage back and I never got to see the finished episode.

Last night I searched around to see if they had it posted anywhere. What I was able to find were the two music segments from the show, which were two of the parts I actually enjoyed working on. The band that performed on the episode I edited was The Cuban Cowboys and they have the "videos" posted on their website. The songs are "Mentiroso" and "El Jardin de la Verdad".

I also discovered, as you can see in the "El Jardin" clip, that I am listed as the editor in the credits, but that they spelled my name wrong!

But then...who doesn't spell my name wrong?