A9:R Status Board #1: A Mixed Bag

Happy July, everyone...and have a happy 250th (if you're from the US of A)! It's going to be raining quite a bit here in Philly, and I'm running off for a canoe/camping trip in the BWCA to dodge the heat wave! Then, I'm giving a presentation at the Allegheny Observatory back in the old stomping grounds of Pittsburgh before finally coming back home and getting to work on Apollo 9.

I've put in a somewhat large order of film for Colorlab for the purpose of "buying down cost" for future projects. A full breakdown of the fees and costs associated is provided above. The remaining overhead is for the thumbnail artist, a new musical artist who I am taking a chance on and collaborating with, (they're making brand new music for this film) and things like cloud storage costs, etc. I'd like to talk about this $3,173 price tag on footage, though, because it's higher than I anticipated.Apollo 9 launched on a very cloudy, foggy day. The close-up engineering stuff is good, and there's a couple of awesome long-range tracking shots, taken I believe aerially (or at least not in the immediate KSC area). Not the kind of mission you need a whole lot of different launch angles for.Here is the footage I am ordering on this project cycle:KSC (ALOTS) AS-203 Chase Plane FootageKSC - Saturn AS 202 IGPA Site - Track Through SeparationKSC - Launch and Track of Apollo 5 KSC - Apollo 9 Launch and TrackKSC - Apollo 10 Crew Suiting Up and Breakfast / Apollo 10 Launch and TrackHearst Metrotone News - Apollo 12 Pool Footage, Breakfast, Suiting White Room ActivityKSC - Apollo 13 Launch and TrackKSC - Apollo 13 LaunchKSC - Apollo 13 Launch and White Room PullbackKSC - Skylab 4/SA-208 Launch, Liftoff and TrackingKSC - STS-2: View Of Overall Launch Vehicle During Ignition and Liftoff, Tower Camera and Static ShotsApollo 9 Launch Item E-52It's all over the place, and much of this footage is for 2027 projects. I am starting to increase my requests for an "Early Apollo" film that will cover inception through Apollo 7, and I am keeping a keen eye on Skylab which will follow Venera (which will follow Apollo 9), as well as an Early Shuttle film (ALT, STS 1-4). I am also, eventually, going to be redoing all my Apollo videos through 15. I will be throwing all of this footage into the Apollo 9 project folder temporarily, making it available for more Patrons while 9:R is being worked on (rather than just immediately throwing it into the $30 'everything' vault). With a relatively "cheap" project like 9 -- and I say that only because I already have all of the onboards/TV, it's an opportunity, I think, for us to position the channel better for future projects to avoid big cost "spikes" like ASTP. I'd like to see the project cost curve flatten out and remain as consistent as possible, but that's probably just my OCD. If I could come up with a nice, even magic number that would work for everything, boy that would be nice.So, we're going to be ordering a lot of interesting stuff on this run. And a little birdie told me that I am going to be able to trade this footage for complete STS 1 through STS-4 onboards, and possibly a little extra. But you didn't hear that from me.

This is pretty exciting! I really enjoyed making ASTP. I've talked about it before but getting a chance to throw up a shingle in a really uncharted area is really the best part of YouTube. I know a lot of you are really looking forward to Venera, and I absolutely promise that I won't do another switcharoo on you. Venera is happening after Apollo 9, I swear it. You robotic-mission-lovers have been very patient with me and I owe you big time. July travel notwithstanding, I am going to try and push the gas pedal a bit with Apollo 9. Not to any extent that it sacrifices the quality, but with resources like the AFJ and the existing availability of footage and access to sources, etc...9 is a cakewalk compared to ASTP.9, Venera, Skylab, Cassini, Early Shuttle, 10? That sounds...pretty nice. What a bunch of subjects all in a string that could really use a better treatment than they've gotten so far! An exciting time for Homemade Documentaries indeed.Thanks again, you all.

-JT