Making our own documentery

[shadylane]

we should do our own documentary. try and sell it to vice or someone all profits going to the legalization process.

WooTeck started the Idea, so don't blame me

[shadylane]

Points that should be made are.
1. We can make up to 200 gallons of beer and wine a year, but it's illegal to purify it with distillation.

[Haus]

So what is a reasonable amount for distillation for "personal use"?
Think about the numbers per 365 days and still be considered casual drinking.
5 750ml per gallon.
In all honesty, I think even if it did come to pass, 10-15 gallons tops, roughly a 1/5th a week as "personal use".

[Plaincrazy]

I know everyone will hate me for bringing up that show but...
Seems everything I see new on that "moonshiners" show I have seen here on HD already, rice shine, two boilers to one thumber, etc...
Seems some one is cashing in already, more like a "mockumentary" though

[shadylane]

Making our own documentary is probably a pipe dream, but we need to talk about what needs to be said and how to say it.

[pfshine]

Instead of purifying I prefer the term dehydrating.

[T-Pee]

Can I be Tickle?

tp

[goose eye]

You goin Bona fide and gonna make this
before then? Think I'd be skittish in the credit lines.

So I'm tole

[Bushman]

It would only fly as a one time documentary unlike Moonshiners as mentioned above we would not have enough drama. Telling the truth about safety and responsibility it would never become a series but might get more followers online if they new the truth about distilling.

[cranky]

I like the idea of a real documentary that shows we focus on safety and making better alcohol than we can buy. The why we do it. Maybe the number of people doing this, the number of stills being sold to normal people, the legalization efforts, the poisoning of people by the government to make people think that home distilling is not safe. Talk about the minuscule size of our stills, 25 gallons is more of a nano still than a micro still when micro is considered less than 40,000 gallons a year. As far as amounts, while we generally feel it is a bad idea, it is technically possible and legal for us to make a wine that is 20% ABV. So 200 gallons/20% equals 40 gallons of distillate a year. Granted cuts are made which reduce that but even after cuts it comes to around 40 proof gallons a year or 200 bottles, not even a bottle a week but I can go down to the store and legally buy as many bottles as I want every single day. If I want to buy 2,3,4 bottles a day nobody would stop me. A real documentary could go a long way towards legalization efforts but may not have enough of the outlaw fantasy idea people want to believe.

[bearriver]

I am not skilled with a video camera but if someone wants to document my corner of the world then I am ready and willing to open up.

VICE would likely do it and make a great doc. Someone might want to consider emailing them.

[MyUncleMo]

It's possible to do a grassroots Doc with everybody in their own little still house somewhere...

1. Come up with the script.
2. Assign a "segment" to whichever member is best fit to provide the video and proper advise.
3. Each member shoots their own segment.
4. Somebody skilled to string them together in any digi moviemaker application such as iMovie or Adobe Premier etc.
5. Include a Narrator to use to transition the segments into one intellectual factual piece that makes the point the community is looking to make. Whatever that may be...
6. Add some banjo pickin' background music and release it on iTunes!

Bingo bango! There is your Doc.

Watch any Discovery channel or History channel show like History of Booze or How to: Bacardi Factory and see the format and try to emulate that in your segment.

Ok - discuss

[MichiganCornhusker]

Good suggestions coming in here. I would be willing to do a little how-to type clip, with some personal ramblings about the how and why I do it. No faces...
I don't know how to do the video part, but my kids do. I'm sure we have the resources here on this forum to pull something like this off.

[bearriver]

My name, location, and face is already public so I dont really have any reservations personally. Lets do this!

[masonsjax]

What UncleMo suggests is exactly how the beer hobbyists made their short video "I am a homebrewer". That method seemed to work pretty well.

http://youtu.be/xwy6XMN30CA" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;" rel="nofollow

[Jimbo]

Im in. List me as Jimbo in the credits, nothing more. I could do a bit on Apples to Brandy, or maybe Bourbon on a Budget. Or maybe Single Malt Simplicity.

[Coyote]

Such an effort "might" be best aired on the internet, rather than attempting to get it on T.V.
How one causes something to go viral, I know nothing about such things.

A well done you tube video that leads to a documentary of 30 to 60 minutes. . . might be the ticket


Coyote

[MichiganCornhusker]

Im in. List me as Jimbo in the credits, nothing more. I could do a bit on Apples to Brandy, or maybe Bourbon on a Budget. Or maybe Single Malt Simplicity.

Yep, I think getting it out there that we're not just making bathtub gin, that we are actually making the full range of spirits, and doing it quite well. Show the diversity of what folks are doing.

[BaxtersDad]

I am fairly skilled with Final Cut Pro X, which is the next step up (a BIG step!) from iMovie. I would be glad to do the video editing.

I can do what you see in the homebrewers' video, every bit of it.

[pfshine]

Perhaps a section on building, safety, testing and, cleaning. Making your own fittings and big diameter pipe from small diameter pipe. I think fabrication should be a part of it so nobody says stills are made from lead pipe jb weld and old used car radiators.

[T-Pee]

Monkey masks!


I kin do an oaking segment.

tp

[Antler24]

I think it's a great idea, sub'd!

[shadylane]

Just a couple of thoughts.
Is a documentary in our best interest? In other words, is it better to be low profile while Uncle Sam is thinking about legalizing us?
Something else to think about, when the law changes, the media will want a story.
I'd prefer it was truthful and accurate.

[masonsjax]

Truthful and accurate depiction of our hobby may be what nudges the laws in our favor.

[BaxtersDad]

OK, somebody should outline ideas for a script. This kind of needs to be one or two people, too many cooks spoil the broth.

I think simple rather than detailed would be better, but who knows? This should not be about how to build a still or how to run a still but rather that a lot of people, more than anybody realizes, are already distilling a wide variety of alcoholic beverages, that they are doing so safely and successfully, but that they unfortunately have to do so clandestinely due to the current legal situation, and that it time for Congress and the states to legalize small scale home distilling, putting it on equal footing with home winemaking and homebrewing.

Then, assuming there is consensus on a script, assign segments for shooting, should be shot with DSLRs with a separate sound recording because camera audio is so piss poor.

We should use a Dropbox folder accessible by everyone involved in the production, for posting the clips and successive versions of the editedl video. I have collaborated on a music video with people in Washington, Maryland and Alabama, so I know how it works!

[pfshine]

I'm not sure how many of us have DSLR cameras and boom mikes. I think it might get kinda boring running on a script of a couple guys just saying over and over I make whiskey vodka rum gin whatever and its illegal. Without some sections of running and some explanations people will disengage due to not understanding. People don't realize that ten gallons of wash in means less than 1/2 gallon of good drinking stock out after several months of aging.

[cranky]

OK, somebody should outline ideas for a script. This kind of needs to be one or two people, too many cooks spoil the broth.

I think simple rather than detailed would be better, but who knows? This should not be about how to build a still or how to run a still but rather that a lot of people, more than anybody realizes, are already distilling a wide variety of alcoholic beverages, that they are doing so safely and successfully, but that they unfortunately have to do so clandestinely due to the current legal situation, and that it time for Congress and the states to legalize small scale home distilling, putting it on equal footing with home winemaking and homebrewing.

Then, assuming there is consensus on a script, assign segments for shooting, should be shot with DSLRs with a separate sound recording because camera audio is so piss poor.

We should use a Dropbox folder accessible by everyone involved in the production, for posting the clips and successive versions of the editedl video. I have collaborated on a music video with people in Washington, Maryland and Alabama, so I know how it works!

+1 I was thinking the same thing. We need to show that not just hillbillies in the backwoods do this but also virtually every kind of person.

[Snackson]

Such an effort "might" be best aired on the internet, rather than attempting to get it on T.V.
How one causes something to go viral, I know nothing about such things.

A well done you tube video that leads to a documentary of 30 to 60 minutes. . . might be the ticket


Coyote

I think you hit it on the head. When it's all said and done we can get it plastered all over the net and continue to share.

I think this would be a great thing to help push the legalization effort and even get Brewhaus and others onboard that have been fighting for a while.

[MyUncleMo]

"I am a home distiller... and this is what I do!"
10 minutes from everybody should put together a nice piece.
The big Question is WHAT is the message and WHO do you want to see it.

[rgreen2002]

Just a couple of thoughts.
Is a documentary in our best interest? In other words, is it better to be low profile while Uncle Sam is thinking about legalizing us?
Something else to think about, when the law changes, the media will want a story.
I'd prefer it was truthful and accurate.

Love the idea and I believe Shadylane has a point. Any possibility that the idea could be discussed with the folks in HDA or the group involved with HR 2903 and S.1562? Maybe they could get the message across.