Meet Deanna Rashell

We’re excited to introduce you to the always interesting and insightful Deanna Rashell. We hope you’ll enjoy our conversation with Deanna below.

Deanna, so many exciting things to discuss, we can’t wait. Thanks for joining us and we appreciate you sharing your wisdom with our readers. So, maybe we can start by discussing optimism and where your optimism comes from?
My optimism comes from a few sources, one thing I like to do is to reflect on my past wins, for example I will look back on all of the films I have completed, booked roles or jobs and even awards I have received. If I was featured along stars, I will look back at those times and briefly enjoy the moment again and validate my accomplishments, I find this gives me renewed energy towards my goals and helps to melt away the stops and barriers I am facing. Sometime I get optimism from watching others films and from seeing others achieve their goals. I try to focus on the fact that it is possible, whatever I am striving for, this way the majority of my attention goes towards the goal instead of towards the obstacles.

Thanks, so before we move on maybe you can share a bit more about yourself?
I work in the film industry. My primary passion is performing in front of the camera, however, I also have a deep love for filmmaking. I have created 27 short films so far and just recently finished up a 52 minute science-fiction pilot, which I am working on taking to the next level. We will either create a TV series out of it, or a feature film series.

In addition to that, I have another short film coming out soon, it’s almost done in the editing process and then I plan to do a few more shorts this year and also expand my comedy Web Series.

A few years ago I created a web series called The Granny Diaries, I play Granny and several other characters, and for most of them I actually do all of the camera, audio, lighting and editing work as well. I just wanted something that could keep me creative & busy and where I didn’t have to rely on other people to work for no pay and where I could shoot each episode at my convenience, so I decided to learn how to film myself, which with today’s technology is much easier than it would have been say 10 years ago.

In the past I have created business videos and now I’m looking at expanding into 30 second commercial spots. So once I finish the films I have slated above. I’m going to start planning out a few spec commercials and see if that is something that I love and if it is that I’m going to pursue that avenue.

I’m also looking to start up a new film group in my area, I may start it on Meet Up first and then work with a local theater where we can feature indie films and help others get their work out to the world!

If you had to pick three qualities that are most important to develop, which three would you say matter most?
My advice is just to start! Fall on your face, that’s ok! If you’re going to make films, make short films, like 3 minute films or 5 minute films, keep making films and keep learning from your mistakes and with each one try to become technically more correct.

Also, realize that your film may not be perfect but it may be amazing so don’t give up just because your audio wasn’t great or your lighting was a great or you didn’t get enough coverage, just keep learning and observing and one thing for independent filmmakers, pay attention to set decoration, you should always look at what’s happening behind your subject, rarely should you ever see a blank wall unless the scene actually calls for it, take the time to move things behind your subject every time you move the camera and you will take your filmmaking to the next level.

Don’t be lazy when it comes to setting up the shot, it takes a few minutes to move a plant, hang a light weight photo on the wall or put some thing in the back of your subject every time you move the camera & it will make your art pop! Learn audio as quickly as you can, bad audio will break your film but if you’re just getting started, you’re probably going to have bad audio so just keep on going until you learn how to get it right. The thing is don’t give up and surround yourself with positive people who believe in you and anybody who makes you doubt your skills or criticizes you, I say get rid of them, if you didn’t ask for the criticism and they just openly criticize you, they’re really not your friend in my opinion and in reality are they an award winning superstar filmmaker who you aspire to be like, if not, then do you really want their negative energy?

Same goes for Actors, if you’re in a class, and that teacher makes you feel like crap, stop going to the class, even if you already paid in advance, don’t go, why subject yourself to that negatively, you can easily find other classes where you actually grow as an artist, where the teacher isn’t pushing his or her opinions down your throat and they’re where they are3 actually trying to make you a stronger performer.. At the end of the day it’s your art! Every Casting Director, every Producer and every Director is going to have their own viewpoint of your creation so if you’re trying to please your teacher by doing what your teacher thinks is right then you’re going to get a boxed into a hole and you’re not going to be creating the art the way you want to create it.

Okay, so before we go we always love to ask if you are looking for folks to partner or collaborate with?
I am actively looking for a small core of creative people, ideally they would also have a lot of production experience like DP, camera opp, audio, Set Design, etc. where we could create content to push forward or acting careers and also our filmmaking careers. So these people would not just be actors but they would have a passion for filmmaking and they would have to have a decent amount of real experience, later we could take people that don’t have as much experience, who really want to learn, but the core group of people would need to actually have filmmaking experience, and we would have to have a similar vision for what we want to create.

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