Landon Parks

Since the introduction of minimum wage laws under the FLSA, it has always been illegal, more or less, for companies to employ anyone for free. The two exceptions are volunteers in the nonprofit world (who may receive a small stipend - but not based on time worked) and Unpaid interns at for profit companies, only when those interns meet strict requirements such as not displacing a paid worker and not performing work that earns the company any profit. Basically, in the for-profit world, 85% (number I made up) of unpaid internships are illegal. It's just a matter of who catches it and who doesn't. NOW, there are ways around this. Perhaps you could form an LLC and bring in your cast and crew as partners rather than employees... as long as each owns 5% or more - they are exempt from wages. Won't work on a large movie thought because you'll probably have too many "partners" to give each 5% and still maintain any yourself. There are other ways as well, such as paying at least minimum wage and deferring the rest, Hiring people under the age of ___ (depends on the state) and then paying them less than minimum wage as allowed under some laws of states. In Ohio, you can pay $4.25 per hour for the first 90 days. It's meant something like a trial period to encourage hiring young workers. Sorry, but there are zero ways for a profit making venture to hire employees without paying them. Legally anyway. BTW - nothing on this page is legal or financial advice. Just my non-professional observations. Take it with a grain of salt.

Good day everyone. I wan to take a minute to introduce myself. My name is Landon Parks, I currently reside in the Cincinnati Ohio area. I have been and on and off member of Cinematography.com for quite a few years now. For several years I served as the Producing Artistic Director for the Bloomington Repertory Theatre Company. While at BRT, I Produced and Directed two shows - Narnia The Musical and The Boxcar Children. Prior to this experience, I had written several screenplays and stage plays. Some of my screenplays include "Quest for the Amulet" and "Fall of the House of Usher". I also wrote two stage plays, "The Floyd Collins Tragedy" and "The Princess and the Goblin". Recently, I become involved in the world of film once again, where I partnered with Aaron Pacentine to Produce "The Wonderful world of Oz: Celebrating the OZ Community". Aaron and I are also currently planning several other movie and web series productions at the present times. I am offering my services as Producer to those in need of assistance getting your project off the ground. I am also interested in hearing from writers who have a completed project that can be produced on a lower budget. I, personally, am not offering finance but can team up with the right person to help seek out capital for a project. If the right project comes along, I'll also bring it to my friend and producer, Aaron Pacentine. You can visit my official website for more information, at http://www.landonparks.info. You can also visit my IMDb Profile at http://www.imdb.com/name/nm5274018/. You can visit my production company website at http://www.eternalimagination.com (still under construction as of the time of this posting - probably be available by 03/25/2013). If you want to discuss any projects with me further, you can contact me at landon2006@gmail.com. --- Attached below are a couple of reels from my work. More is available on my website. --- NARNIA: THE MUSICAL Produced and Directed by Landon Parks for Bloomington Repertory Theatre Co. Lighting Design by Landon Parks. Staring: John Bristow as Peter, Maria Sarah Lysandrou as Lucy, Kennedy Lake as Susan. [media=560x315] [/media] THE WONDERFUL WORLD OZ: CELEBRATING THE OZ COMMUNITY Produced by Aaron Pacentine and Landon Parks. Directed by Aaron Pacentine. Edited by Aaron Pacentine and Landon Parks. [media=560x315]http://youtu.be/pUQMXv7axyM[/media]

3D seems to be becoming the defacto Hollywood standard for blockbuster movies, that's for sure. Frankly, I don't really like it that well. I feel that, in general, it takes away from the story by placing greater emphasis on the effects. I have vowed never to jump on the 3D train. Not only is it expensive and difficult, but it does not add anything to the story.

Check out the Oklahoma Film Commission. They may be able to provide local industry connections. http://www.ok.gov/oklahomafilm/

While I have only written a few screenplays (mainly shorts), I can offer a few pieces of advice: 1. Go into it knowing that your going to be making changes. DO NOT try to perfect any writing form as you start it. This is what revisions and copy-editing are for. when your story first starts flowing, DO NOT interrupt it by paying attention to every little grammatical detail. 2. Play music in the background that matches what your writing. This works for some and not for others, but I find it inspiring to write with low volume music in the background. That's all I can really add to this discussion. But most important - make sure you are writing something you LOVE. Nothing stinks more than a story written by someone who clearly did not like the story in the first place.

When I cast Narnia: The Musical, we rented a meeting room at the local Library. It was great because it had A/V equipment already there. To what extent local Libraries will rent you a room depends though. Some want only non-profits. Other options include Hotel conference rooms, like we did when I cast The Boxcar Children. If your in a big film city like LA, NY or Chicago, you could always go for a dedicated studio. In any case, 90% of your options are going to cost something.

You do not need a degree in a film related film to break into the industry. It couldn't hurt I'm sure, but a lot of "breaking in" is about who you know rather than what degree you have. My advice is network with other filmmakers. Offer to help them on their films. Build a resume you can use to shop around. No one is going to "hire" someone who has not film experience at all, especially for a role that requires you know basic things like camera loading (does anyone still do that). Even slating a production required that you know a process.

Hi Marcus. I'm 24. Hi Stephen. Yeah, that website was just a little side project I put together back in May of 2011, with the intention of hosting it once it was completed. But given that I'm not really "professional" yet or even at a point where most anyone would be interested in hiring me based on my resume, I just sort of pushed it to the wayside. Happy shooting ;-) Landon

I don't mean to bring up an ancient subject (e.g. 2005), but I was browsing Google to see if anyone was talking about me - and sure enough, this little topic popped up at #3. Since everyone (at the time anyway) seemed to be interested in what happened to me, I'll oblige :-). I ended up getting involved in Theatre, helped to form the Bloomington Repertory Theatre Company where I served as Artistic Director from Jan 2010 to April 2011. While there, I directed both Narnia: The Musical and The Boxcar Children. I am now living in Orlando, Florida - getting ready to move to Cincinnati area to began working on constructing yet another theatre company. You can check out some of my work and reviews/photos/videos from Narnia on my website, MY WEBSITE. I just thought it was pretty cool that you guys kept a multi-page forum topic on me :-). Film is still not out of the question, but I have grown up A LOT and learned much more in the last several years - and having looked back on some of my posts when I was younger, I really feel like an idiot trying to act like I knew everything. Anyway, I hope everyone is doing awesome :-), and thanks for the topic :-)). - Landon Parks "Landon D. Parks - made it yet?" - It depends on how you look at it, I suppose :-)

Hey Guys. Been a long time since I have posted or visited here, hope your all doing okay. I have been doing theatre for a while now and have finally decided to embark on producing (or attempting) to produce a film I wrote called Fall Shadows. Since I finally have a little loot saved up, it just might finally happen. On to my question. I'm considering buying the Lumix GH2 from Panasonic to shot on, and I had searched around a bit but could not really find any updated information on rather the HDMI output issue regarding extra frames being inserted was every corrected or if someone had made a patch to fix it? I'm considering the Atomos Ninja to get a 4:2:0 8-Bit directly to 220Mbps ProRes rather than the crappy AVCHD/24Mbps. Just curious if anyone had any updates. Have a great day, Landon Parks Producer / Director http://landon2010.hostei.com