Trying on a new hat. Michael Mufasa as filmmaker. As an interdisciplinarian (yes, that’s a word, but remains red-lined by most spell-checkers), I am often drawn not only to new ideas and theories, but also to new ways of expressing myself.

So with apologies to Yogi Berra, I decided to take another fork in the road. After my undergrad interdisciplinary focus of Human Rights and African/African American Studies, my academic path has evolved. Graduate school has introduced me to a plethora of critical theory with which to apply my albeit rudimentary ideas and commentary.

As a cohort in ASU’s Masters of Interdisciplinary Studies, I have in my reach a number of interesting and enlightening courses. In preparation of my capstone project next spring, I decided to challenge myself with a film production as opposed to a thesis paper. Seemed a little more exciting.

I’ve long-accepted the fact that I am not going to be engaged in a decades long post-grad trajectory. Not to say that I’m running out of time (who really knows anyway?), only that I look more to self-satisfying creativity over positioning for tenure <- that’s probably good advice no matter one’s demographic.

Off I go then. For the fall semester, in addition to the required Methods of Interdisciplinary Research (or something to that effect), I’m enrolled in Advanced Video Production, as well as a Reading and Conference with the same Fine Arts professor. Admittedly, I never took a basic video production course so I have a learning curve to navigate- fast.

That means this summer break is going to be filled with the basics. I bought a new MacBook Pro, upgraded to a 128GB iPhone 6, bought a decent microphone for my Nikon DSLR, and assorted accoutrements. Soon I’ll be enrolling in the Adobe Creative Cloud (student discount, whew), and also Lynda.com where tutorials abound.

While my initial enthusiasm has been tested by the reality of THIS IS HARD, I’m also certain that the appropriate commitment will lead me to competency – at least enough competency to complete my final project.

Roll ’em.

From somewhere hot,

MM