"Third Bridge" made it into the Crested Butte Film Festival! Eric directed and I produced the project. Of course this called for a 5-day extended weekend trip to the mountains. As even more incentive, the festival was generous enough to pay for filmmaker housing, and provided us with VIP passes so every event and film was free. Our trip was Thursday-Monday, Sept 29-Oct 3. The fall colors were at their peak, and I ended up with nearly 10 Gigs of photos.
Sept 29
We headed through Buena Vista and over Cottonwood Pass, stopping for several photo ops on the way. Filmmaker accommodations were at the Nordic Inn, a homey little place in Mt Crested Butte, and one of the few we haven't stayed at before!
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| Lighting is key when shooting fall aspens |
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| Mt. Crested Butte aglow at sunset |
The sunset was spectacular as we drove down to Gunnison after checking in to the hotel. Caught the reception after the opening films at Western State, met a few people, and picked up our welcome bags and passes.
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| Rain curtains at sunset |
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| Filmmaker SWAG bags! |
Sept 30
Spent the morning driving down Kebler Pass and taking photos of the fall colors. Later headed up to Gothic (now I've seen it in every season!), and also tried for a few geocaches in town.
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| Shooting fall colors on Kebler Pass |
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| Aspen Groves along Kebler |
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| Eric at the base of a mining headframe |
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| Nearing Gothic, colors at their peak! |
Got back by 4pm for the Kickoff Party at Brick Oven Pizza. Headed over to the mountain theatre for the 5:30 showing of "Play Again" preceded by a short called "Scrapertown." Play Again was a documentary about taking technology addicted teens into the wilderness on their first outdoors experience.
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| Film Fest Reel |
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| Kickoff party at Brick Oven Pizza |
Unfortunately we didn't have time for another showing before heading to the Filmmakers party at Montanya Distillers. The festival was quite generous with free drink tickets at all the events. Finally met a few of the filmmakers there since most of the people at the gatherings were VIP sponsors. Jacob Siegel-Boettner of "With My Own Two Wheels" was present, Denver-based Phil Mirabito and Ross Smith with their films, and Charlotte Barrett and Sean Fallon of the feature "Virgin Alexander." Also a few film representatives here and there.
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| A portion of the Filmmaker party |
Oct 1
At Noon we had our first showing of "Third Bridge" with the Shorts II program. Got great response from the audience during the Q&A, and the theatre started a little empty but filled up nicely in good time. Next we went to the 3pm showing of "From the Ground Up" and "Back to Life." The first was about 9/11 firefighter's widows and the organizations they started to honor their husbands. "Back to Life" was a documentary on a group of severely injured soldiers from Iraq going on a week long rafting trip down the Grand Canyon.
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| Our first Q&A after the noon showing |
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| More Kebler Pass trips |
After those showings we had just enough time to drive out for some sunset photos, and return for the 8pm "Third Bridge" showing. More of a crowd this time, including several filmmakers we knew. Again we got lots of good feedback and questions, the most popular of which always seems to be "how can I find the bridge?" Later headed over to the VIP Party at Dogwood Cocktail Cabin for more socializing with fellow filmmakers!
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| A favorite photo spot, yup same truck as previous post! |
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| Aspens and afternoon storms |
Oct 2
Eric and I were scheduled to participate in the Filmmaker Talks at Rumors Coffee at 10:45 am. Festival director Michael Brody lead the discussion, and the other filmmakers talking were Phil Mirabito, Charlotte Barrett, Sean Fallon. At noon we headed over to see the Shorts I Program, and at 3pm "If a Tree Falls" a documentary about the Earth Liberation Front. For the 6pm time slot we debated between "Marwencol" or "Virgin Alexander," but eventually went to the latter since we knew the filmmakers Charlotte and Sean fairly well by this time. A good choice since apparently "Marwencol" is on Netflix anyway! Finally on to the last event, the closing party, at The Lodge in Mt. Crested Butte.
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| Eric shares his two cents at the filmmaker talks |
Oct 3
Still looking for more fall photo ops, I headed out just before sunrise to a nearby location to finish filling up my memory card.
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| First light hits Gothic Mountain |
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| Sunrise in the valley |
Deciding to take our time driving back, we stopped at many geocaches and ran into two other teams caching. We usually only run into other cachers during FTF (first to find) runs, but we met a couple from the Springs, then a team of 3 on a daytrip, and ran into the first pair again at another cache later. One of the more fun stops was a hike to some alpine lakes along Cottonwood Pass.
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| Fall Colors on the drive home |
