A Reunion Worth Remembering
Were we really friends after all?
Forty-five years ago, my best friend was a tall, gangly kid named Gary. Although we lived in opposite sides of town and went to different high schools, Gary and I were drawn together by a mutual interest in television, specifically how to make it and profit from it.
We initially met at the local community club. Activities for youth at the community club was a thing back then and we had both signed up for Introduction to Film-Making. He was interested in sound recording; I was interested in camera work and I entered the program with my parents’ 8mm Brownie camera in tow. We learned the mechanics of production and two months later agreed to branch out on our own and work together on a common goal: preparing ourselves for a career in media.
The efforts of our burgeoning production company consisted of two recorded high school football games, a prom, and a graduation exercise. We even got a commission documenting a concrete extrusion process for a local homebuilder, all in amateur 8mm film of course. I would shoot the activity while Gary recorded sound, adding music and narration where necessary. We screened everything with a projector and a tape recorder, never in synchronization, but close enough to make an impression. Graduating to a professional format, 16mm with sound, would come later…
