Behind-The-Scenes: Filming My First Online Class

Today's post is a guest post from my husband, Richie. Richie provides an insight into the behind-the-scenes angst and excitement of filming my first online art class, 'The Melting Pot'.

“That’s the beauty of ART,
it’s the unexpected things that happen.”

— Laura Horn

All the hard work was done. All that remained now was for one artist to take a very brave step and put herself out there, out into the world of internet teaching.

Laura had a vision. She knew exactly how she wanted to paint, but she did not know how to articulate how this process began, let alone how it continued to grow, change, and evolve into a finished piece. This was a process that normally took place in a very quiet, private, home studio where no explanation was needed. It was stress-free and simple. Until now.

Now Laura had to try and convey not only what the process entailed, but how she felt while she painted. For a quiet-spoken and shy person, it was challenging for both of us to come up with a way to film the process without disrupting the creative energy required to complete a piece of art. So we sat down and had a cup of tea. (I had a tim-tam or two).

We planned and planned and planned. Nothing seemed to flow. We spoke about direction, location, lighting, camera angles, audio and on and on we planned. Still nothing gelled. It still felt contrived (which it is) but we wanted it to be natural, organic and beautifully simple.

We set up and started, and about 5 minutes in, we stopped and tore up the script (not literally, we did not have a script). I asked her to trust me. She was unsure as this is a very emotional and personal project. It had to be perfect. I asked her to trust me, and she did. I told her to do what she does best, PAINT. I removed all pressure of getting the shot and we threw PERFECT out the window. I told her my video was going to be a MELTING POT just like her painting, and we would allow the unexpected to happen.

I decided to flip the shot order on its head. Laura could not see how this would work and even when I explained it to her, she was still unsure, but she trusted me, something she would only do once. (Don't mess this up, Richie).

So I did something so simple and so right that we missed it in the planning stage. I told her to PAINT. Don't think about the introduction, don't think about the layers, don't think about the art supplies and the techniques, just PAINT.

And then the unexpected happened. Laura began to paint. She fell in love and it was instant. She knew I was there and the cameras were running, but she was present in her painting. She began to speak simple, clear words and sentences, explaining what, why, and how she was doing what she was doing. It was natural, unplanned, and beautifully imperfect. It was ART.

We shot all the painting's layers in one day. Then we came back and shot the intro and outro a day later. We had fallen into a trap, the trap of perfection and order. It was not until we stopped striving for perfection and decided to shoot in any order we liked that it lifted the pressure to be something or someone she was not. She became what she already was. She was Laura Horn. She just happens to be an amazing artist.