Steve Sherman: Producer, screenwriter and music composer in Marlborough, Massachusetts.

Yeah, I know, there must be a million other threads on here somewhere re this subject, well I didn't see it/them - I just read the one with the Nicholls competition, there are numerous other competitions that I presume will make announcements soon - I'm waiting for Scriptapalooza to unveil their results and the AWG, which is for Australian writers, made their announcements and my name was nowhere in sight - obviously an aberration, LOL - ARE THERE ANY SUCCESS STORIES HERE? - surely someone is in the running for honours, their success partially becomes our success and motivation to keep trying - ANYONE?

I am currently writing a (non-screenplay) story on a forum. Some replies weren't focused on the work itself, but on me, as a writer. Some said " Quit writing! Plow the field instead!", others said: " I hope you have a serious job!". Another one said: " You have absolutely no clue on this subject!". Now, I wrote some screenplays and posted them on various specific websites(where people post screenplays, give and receive feed-back and reviews). There, I received some heavy criticism. Many users provided critic feed-back, some of which was pretty brutal, but none of them got personal. None of them stepped beyond the work itself. I just read the last comment I wrote about...:( What should I do about such comments? Are they ok to receive? Thanks for answering!:)

Do you think that a writer can successfully write in different genres?

Hey Steve, thanks for connecting.

My primary goals for 2015: 1. Promote existing, commercially viable screenplays via contests and Happy Writers ("Truckin' with Smilin' Jack", "Home Brew", "Amoe", "Dusty Works"). 2. Develop the current major, new screenplay ("Set Fire") and prep for promotion. 3. Produce the current animation short ("Bosco Defends the Galaxy"). 4. Invest in networking by helping and being helped by others. Time is too short to do it all and resources are limited. It's a big mountain of pickles, best regularly consumed in small amounts, one day at a time.

Hey Steve, thanks so much for the invite, please keep me in mind if you need any sound or music for your projects, you can check out my, and my audio company's work at http://www.sonicframeproductions.com/audio.aspx or at http://soundcloud.com/sonicframeproductions/sets :-)

Sound Editors - Any feedback on these? http://audio-editing-software-review.toptenreviews.com/

Hello talented Bostonian filmmakers and production crews, I'm looking and have been thinking of creating a meet and greet here in the boston area! I would love to connect with many of you and see what talents a looming in the dark so we can all collaborate and keep creating! please reply if any one is interested! cheers!

Writing is like running. It only feels good when you stop. We all like having written. It is the process that is like nails in the forehead. My freshmen students tell me writing is easy -- they have no crap detector, no inner editor, no critic, no quality control. They just vomit forth a draft and call it complete. Rewriting? Bah. What say?

Samuel Estes has posted here a great opportunity for those who have some money to buy some high quality reverb products. But what do those of us who are on a budget do if we don't want to spend money on reverb/convolution. In my case, I am trying to direct my music budget towards finally moving towards new orchestral samples and other samples on the Kontakt platform. Well, as many of you may know there are various ways to get reverb/convolution. It may be builtin to your sampler. For example, since I have been on the Gig platform for 10 years now, the last two Gigastudio samplers had builtin support for reverb/convolution (and some pretty sophisticated models which supported two dimensional placement of multiple microphones and hall sizes). But as many of you know, the final version of Gigastudio (4.0), was orphaned by Tascam (and the technology sold to Garritan but never supported) and GS 4 (and the associated USB security key) would not work on platforms newer than Windows Vista (i.e., Windows 7 & 8). And the Aria sampler, used by Garritan has built-in reverb support, but as far as I know, supports only the Garritan (and not Giga) samples. So that leads us back to the replacement sampler for Gigastudio called, GPlayer (a different vendor, soundlib.com). Now this player does not have builtin reverb, but does support VSTs. That brings us to the next possible options - like me, you may have purchased more than one music creation tool. I have both the DAW (sequencer), Sonar Producer and a music sheet creation product, Sibelius 7. Now Sibelius does not really have builtin reverb (though some may claim it does), but both products support VSTs and Sonar comes with VSTs for reverb and convolution. So if you have that environment, remember that you can use the VSTs of a software product (assuming the license agreement does not prohibit it), with your other software products that support VSTs. In my case however, I have not been keeping up with recent versions of Sonar Producer and so my version is a 32-bit version with 32-bit VSTs. But the version of Sibelius I use is a 64-bit version (which supports significantly more memory for the instrument samples) and that software will not support 32-bit VSTs. So I was in the predicament of having to find a 64-bit VST for reverb/convolution. Some time ago, I discovered, Freeverb3 (http://freeverb3vst.sourceforge.jp/) which includes a free 64-bit VST which works fine with Sibelius. There are a collection of free VSTs - the one I use is Freeverb3VST_Impulser2.dll which I put in the same directory as my other VSTs. Now what do I do for the Freeverb data - the files used to define the reverb space and set all the values of reverb? There are free ones that work with Freeverb3. Here are some I use: On the site with Freeverb are sets of sound effects that work with it to define the space - http://freeverb3vst.sourceforge.jp/samples.shtml Another company is Voxengo and it sells stuff but also has some free stuff: http://www.voxengo.com/group/free-vst-plugins (free VSTs) and http://www.voxengo.com/impulses/ (free Impulse files usable by Freeverb3 as well). How does the free reverb compare to the purchased ones - I have not done a comparison and there will be some that do not find the quality of Freeverb3 sufficient for their needs. But if you are on a budget and need to get into the deep end quickly - this may be a good place to start. For me, free is good!

Ditto on the concept of saving and sharing ideas and to keep those ideas coming. Most are terrible, but they can lead to good things. I use ideas folders on my laptop. Too many to do in a lifetime, but plenty to tap into when the time comes. One of my favorite files is a file of potential screen names for porn actors. Gets giggles from family members. But, my wife threatens that I can never, ever, EVER actually use any of them.

Hi there, thanks for connecting.

The following examples of loglines might be of interest given the many posts asking for assistance with these things that seem to bedevil many screenwriters. These five scripts were selected by the Academy's judges from about 7,000 entries. Perhaps what's most important about these loglines is that each of them attracted the attention of first-stage readers and continued to do so as these scripts worked their way up to the final judges level. Frank DeJohn & David Alton Hedges Current residences: Santa Ynez, CA "Legion" Just days before he is to leave a life of warfare behind him, a Roman Centurion must assume command of a group of misfit soldiers trapped deep within hostile country. ___ Patty Jones Current residence: Vancouver, BC, Canada "Joe Banks" The son of a Nobel Prize–winning novelist via a genius sperm bank is determined to follow in his father's footsteps, but suddenly finds himself on a wild odyssey with his real father, a drinking, man's-man, lothario author of airport novels who was stripped of his own Nobel after a sex scandal. ___ Alan Roth Current residence: Suffern, NY "Jersey City Story" A basketball star faces his bitter past when he's pursued by a young boy growing up in his old room in the projects. ___ Stephanie Shannon Current residence: Los Angeles, CA "Queen of Hearts" Inspired by true events, this is the story of "Alice in Wonderland" and "Through the Looking Glass" author Lewis Carroll (aka Charles L. Dodgson) and how his relationship with the real Alice Liddell and her family may have inspired one of the world's most beloved pieces of children's literature. ___ Barbara Stepansky Current residence: Burbank, CA "Sugar In My Veins" When a mutual attraction blossoms between a fourteen year old violin prodigy and her sister's much older boyfriend, it leads to a risky forbidden affair that has both liberating and disastrous consequences for their lives.

When a large eccentric family buys a defunct church property to live in, the townspeople mistake the surly grandfather for a minister and start showing up for church on Sundays. (Kind of like Modern Family meets We Bought a Zoo.)

Check out my first edit from a gopro video. "Shot" by my cousin. I love editing and watching the right song pour over the cuts..... http://youtu.be/YDvaCQMoFUA

The movie, television and music industries have been in the news of late. Most recently, Variety announced a 19% employment drop over the past two years and that Warner Brothers will have layoffs. This means dumping more talented people into a field that some say is so crowded that someone needs to die before more can enter. As a writer/producer, I'm going to create, regardless. The Stage32 community has become an integral part of that for me. I would sooner give up breathing. But, what impact (short- and long-term) do you think this will have on the Stage32 community?