Thinking about giving up on my dream...

Sounds like exciting times. Always put your loved ones first and involve your partner in the decision, if you have one. As a stranger, my advice and support should mean less than that of those closest to you. Good luck!

My feeling is the result of my own situation. I had done watch and clock repairs for 20 years, when I took a job managing jewellery stores for a national chain. I worked as a jewellery store manager for 20 years. By the 15th year of working for them, the writing was on the wall. I knew I would not be retiring from the management job. In 1985, I decided to work up my watch and clock repair aptitudes into a formal business. I spent the last 5 years working for them, but also working for myself. By 1990, I was making more working for myself than I was making, working for them! The store I was managing was being closed, and I was offered continued employment at a 40% salary reduction to work as a sales person in another store. Or they would pay me my salary for a year, if I resigned. I tripped over my tongue when I told the area manager I had just quit! In short, never turn you back on a money making skill when you make a change, and DON’T sell your tools,

I have a degree in stage/film. I also took electronics classes.

I was lucky. The school had a good department. I met the right people and got an aprentiship at Sprocket systems (A division of Lucasfilm that did the post production.) This work was moonlighting evenings and weekend. During the day I did customer service for one of the first computer retailers. How I met people. This was in the early 1980s and they were getting 10,000 resumes a day. Most willing to work for experience. I was there becouse I was good at making computers work, and had a knack for cleaning the dust out of the KEM editing machines. I had also built my own 8mm computer controlled camera stand using a Timex sinclair zx80 as a processor to fire the camera and do the mocap on the animation stand. There is still an animation stand burried in the back yard I got surplus.

I actually wanted to be a disney animator, So I was always working on little animated snippets. There came a time though when I had to choose. So I chose to work at apple (working with laser printers, which could be used to make the cels used for animation.) I still keep a web domain, In case I ever do become inspired to return to doing this sort of thing. I also have spend many hours days and years restoring an old Kodak film scanner (the same drivers are used to digitize cine film) It was finding parts for that what lead me into collecting some film cameras, and from that back into working on watches.

It was hard to give up the dream of being a filmmaker. It felt like convincing other people to tilt windmills. Highly competitive, and everyone wants to second guess the other person. Most of the people in the biz got there by luck and accident. They are good at what they do. One has to be the best of the best. Most of the work is like plumbing or similar skilled trade.

Some of the most boring days I ever spent were on film shoots. Or in the editing suites. Watching the same thing ad infiantium. It seemed like there was months and months of things not happening. Then there was a film. I guess it was what ever we were working on. Then one had to find another job. Apple was not that different in a way. Every 18 months the world changes. So keeping up with the latest is always a challenge.

Filmaking evolved around the time of WWI. By people who did not want to be in the army. On the other hand they structured it with the same chain of command. Director is the general. The DPs and CInematographers are the majors. It is the enlisted folk who chose them. The people who really make films are accountants who are good at spending other people's mony. The products are investements like any other.

One of my teachers worked with Roger Corman. My teacher said no one would ever see his film which starred Jack Nicolson (his first) He also made the prediction that with 1000 channels of television there would be a time when anyone could make a film. He was wrong about the first and sort of right about the second. Back in the 1950s one did not have to pay actors or anyone else. So a lot of B movies got made. Then the labor laws changed. Why there are so many lawyers and accountants now involved. No film ever makes a profit, so share is profits are always zero. One can however aquire a pre production share which is why there are no profits. These pay dividends like any other stock or bond.

Someone (It is said to be Walt's brother Roy) figured out that if films were not seen one could borrow money against them. This made them rare and collateral for the loan. Every now an then (Roy used 7 years) one would take the film out of the vault and show it. The Disney brothers were also silent partners in Farnsworth's television invention. They had lost the rights to Oswald the rabbit, who became Mickey mouse with inflated ears. Mickey was the first image ever sent by television in 1926 or 1927. Disney also created the ABC TV network in the 1950s to pay for Disneyland. Later they did sell out to Sarnoff and moved to NBC for color. Eventually ABC took back the mouse.

It can be seen that films jump between the streaming channels even licenced to the competitors. This is how they make money. Old films (widgets) are the collateral used to borrow money to make the new films. If a film tanks at the box office. They get an old war horse out and make it available again.

Sometimes I think the real way one makes dreams happen, is to not mistake luck for skill.

There are also things that happen what make one question free will vs pre destination. A lot of what we do has great impact on the world. Especially when one works with someone like Steve Jobs. Small things can make huge changes.

It only takes a single grain of rice (or wheat.) to tip the scale. But all the grains need to be moving in the same direction.

(Now I am wondering how many grains of alum does it take to rust out a single screw in a watch plate. Or how much longer it will take before I can put my watch back together.