“Foreign Experts”
About 30 bajillion years ago, I was in high school. I’d like to say that my friends and I were “normal,” but that would only be true if you think an unhealthy obsession with 90’s era video equipment is normal.
Even though we only had one camera between us, we tried to work in a home video whenever the teachers gave us open-ended group projects.
There were no iPhones. No fancy digital video editors. Just my friend Jared and two-paired VCRs, slaving away late into the night.
When filming, it was also essential to get it right on the first take, because the project was always due the very next day, and the crappy lighting was just going to get a whole lot crappier as the sun went down.
When I went to college, I left the video camera behind, and in my aging vernacular, “home-video” gradually redefined itself as something you did when your kids were acting silly.
But in 2019 or 2020, I came across a hilarious video of one of my writing friends pretending to get reviews from all around the world. Every time I watched the video, I laughed at the funny things Mike says while “advertising” some of the best middle grade fiction I’ve read recently.
We talked on-and-off about doing a spinoff, but we didn’t get around to making it until 2023. And then I had to relearn how to video edit.
It was fantastic fun.
Enjoy!
