A year ago, when I was planning to move back to West Virginia (after being away for nearly 14 years), I talked to my then-girlfriend about creating a program that helped regular people create their own documentaries. I had recently completed the certificate program at the Center for Documentary Studies at Duke Universityand I wanted to replicate that sort of program here in West Virginia. My thinking was that we (West Virginians) don’t do a very good job telling our own stories. We usually let outsiders do it for us and then complain because they got it wrong.
While I lived away, I told people where I was from and more than once I had to explain:
“No, I don’t know how to play a banjo. Deliverance was actually filmed in Georgia.”
Flash forward about six months to the opening of DigiSo at the West Virginia State University Economic Development Center on the West Side of Charleston. I wrote about it in my blog post Digital Age andWest Virginia.
A couple weeks ago, I attended the opening for the new Creators Programand last night I attended a seminar from the program. All I have to say is Danny Boyd and the rest of the crew at DigiSo have done exactly what I hoped to do. And they are doing it right.
“The Creators Program is a series of short community workshops focused on key skills and knowledge essential to “creating” for mass media and art.”
This is a chance for everyone who has thought “I want to tell a story” but didn’t know how to do it to get the tools and the support they need. And learn from the very people who do it for a living.
The Creators Program isn’t just about making films. At the program I attended last night, presented by Amy Saunders, grants administrator for the West Virginia Humanities Council, there were people working for small non-profits and looking for ways to tell a story, an author looking to publish his book about education, a couple filmmakers and a musician producing her second album, while thinking about creating a documentary about the Italian stone cutters who migrated to West Virginia. Two ladies were working to create a food pantry at their church and looking at ways to tell the story and find funding. Amy talked about what it takes to get grant money to produce projects.
It just so happens, Danny has asked me to put on a seminar next month on Self Publishing. And I have an idea that I’m working on, about documentaries, that might come around next year. In short, this is an amazing opportunity for people to get involved and learn to tell stories. The facilities at DigiSo are as good, or better, than what I used at Duke . This is definitely something to be proud of and we all need to take advantage of this program.
I can’t wait until the first person graduates with a Creators Certificate and finishes up a project with skills they learned at DigiSo. I will be there cheering. Because I know it means average people are succeeding at telling their own stories.
Upcoming seminars include:
· Self Publishing for Writers – Eric Douglas 10/19 – 10/20
· Entertainment/IP Law – Robert Bandy & Kevin Levine 11/2
· Working With the Film Office – Pam Haynes (and WV Film Office staff) 12/8
You can check the schedule and register at http://wvsu.incutrack.net/calendar/calendar.cfmfor all classes. And there is a lot more in the works for next year too.