It’s all about STORY.

I’ve been fortunate enough to be paid to film, to edit, to write and work in the business of visually communicating — in newsrooms, documentaries, commercials and corporate gigs. My business cards had more slashes than Guns and Roses. Director-slash-DP, producer-slash director. Writer-slash-director.

I love technology and cameras, which I now realize is a blessing as well as a curse. For years I would visit every NAB, every industry trade show and be enthralled at every announcement of bigger and better, higher resolution this and more cinematic that. ‘Check this out, it looks like film. Look at that camera, look at those lights and microphones.’ Too many thoughts, too much stuff going on. After 3 or 4 days of walking through literally square miles of bigger and better, I would always have this one thought. It’s all about story.

Isn’t that what the prophet Robert Rodriguez showed us? One could, with a small budget and several trips to Radio Shack and Home Depot, make a movie that gets the attention of the film world. Then you’ll have the resources and clout to tell your next story on a bigger and better and higher level. Same thing with the producers of the Blair Witch Project. Everyone talks about the shabby film cameras, the cheap video cameras and the bare bones budget. Few filmmakers talk about the truly revolutionary ideas that spawned these movies. And yet these movies started with an idea and someone bold enough and disciplined enough to write it down.

Most will forgive the grainy and the blurry, but we, as an audience, cannot find the grace to forgive a filmmaker who doesn’t have a good story, or doesn’t tell his story well. Whenever you get filmmakers together in one room, there’s a lot of geek-speak about cameras, filters, dollies, cranes and other equipment and processes. And I’m right there. That’s my language, too. Pen and paper isn’t nearly as sexy to talk about at as a camera or lenses. There’s not much fun you can have discussing Final Draft. But in the end I walk away and remind myself, it’s all about story. It’s about words on a paper.

Perhaps the next bunch of cards I make should just say

Dean Krueger / Storyteller

So there it is. I’m trying to remove the slashes in my life. I’m a storyteller at heart. I’m passionate about creating stories and pictures that move you.

I hope to hear your story one day.