Our site goes live

on April 25th For more info go to http://bit.ly/eVOVXo Cheers~Cliff

Cancer survivors & Loved ones:

Share your video story with us with links back to you http://bit.ly/eVOVXo Cheers~Cliff

The Day I Found Out Project

‘The Day I Found Out’ website began with 22 professionally produced videos focused on cancer patients and survivors telling their stories about the day they found out about their cancer. We are looking to expand the scope of the project, by offering cancer fighters and their loved ones the opportunity to download their own ‘day they found out’ stories. We are prepared to link your facebook page, twitter account, webpage and other links to your video.

FAQ:

Who can participate?

Anyone intimately and personally affected by cancer may participate, including patients, survivors, and loved ones.

What about children?

We are excited to have children participate, though how a child participates is up to their parents or guardians. Children are especially encouraged to include their grown-ups in their videos.

What should the videos be like?

We want your story in your own words. Hopefully these guidelines will be useful:

The videos should start with the exact day of your diagnosis, if possible.

The following questions can serve as a guide. If a particular question doesn’t mean as much to you, don’t worry about it. Also, don’t feel like you have to answer them in order. These questions are geared towards the patients and survivors but loved ones making videos can amend the questions to fit their own stories.

• Did you suspect something was wrong? If so, did you see a doctor right away?
• What went through your head when you heard your doctor say, ‘it’s cancer?’
• Were you alone with your doctor? And how did you break the news to your family and friends?
• What did you do as soon as you left the doctor’s office/hospital?
• What sort of treatment options did your doctor offer? And how did you decide on a treatment? Was it a clinical trial? If so, why did you choose that route?
• What was the emotional turning point? Was there a moment you thought, ‘I’m definitely going to beat this?’
• Who or what helped you get through it? Where did you draw inspiration? Did your cancer inspire you to get involved with a particular project, movement or organization?
• If you could go back in time to before you had cancer, would you have done anything differently? Would there be anything you would change about what you did after you found out?
• What makes you tell your story today?
• What would be your advice to someone who has just been diagnosed with cancer?
• What else are you besides a cancer patient or a survivor? What makes you 'you'?

We want your honest story. Maybe you've come to terms with your cancer; maybe you haven't. Maybe you've made peace with it; maybe you've not. We are interested in the real emotions that you felt or are feeling.

You mentioned that we could talk about cancer related projects, movements or organizations. What does that mean?

Many people directly affected by cancer have made lemonade out the lemons that have been seemingly dealt to them. Millions of these people have turned their focus outward into fundraising, research, merchandising and other ventures, all to fight the good fight against cancer. Supporting these causes is often a major part of healing and renewal and we want to hear that part of the story, too. However, the main focus of your video should be you, not your project. As a reminder, we’re more than happy to link the videos to your web pages, facebook pages, blogs, etc.

I’m not much of a filmmaker. Can you help me edit my video?

We can do some basic editing and would be happy to help out with that, free of charge.

Can you help me film my video?

We're based in Seattle, Washington, USA. If it's convenient for you to get here, we'd be glad to. Contact information is listed below.

What about the technical side of it?

Our video requirements are basically the same as Youtube’s requirements

· Videos must be smaller than 2GB in size

· We will support

o WebM files - Vp8 video codec and Vorbis Audio codecs

o .MPEG4, 3GPP and MOV files - Typically supporting h264, mpeg4 video codecs, and AAC audio codec

o .AVI - Many cameras output this format - typically the video codec is MJPEG and audio is PCM

o .MPEGPS - Typically supporting MPEG2 video codec and MP2 audio

o .WMV

o .FLV - Adobe-FLV1 video codec, MP3 audio

· We recommend that videos not be more than 5 minutes.

· We are subject to the same copyright laws as anyone else. Please keep that in mind when you are creating your videos. There’s no point in going to all the trouble to make it only to have it pulled from our site for copyright infringement. You may want to read what Youtube has to say about it.

· When the new version of our site has been completed, you’ll be able to upload videos with a few clicks of a button. Until then, you may send videos directly to us at cmccloe@copacino.com. There are also dozens of file sharing sites online.

· Please include your full name and a few ways we can reach you. Obviously, contact information will not be shared with anyone without your permission. If you feel comfortable doing so, list the city where you live, as well. Also, please tell us the exact kind of cancer or cancers you have; we want people to be able to search the site by cancer type.

I have other questions.

Please feel free to email me at cmccloe@copacino.com; you can also tweet me at @thedayifoundout.

Thank you again for your interest in this project. We’d be grateful if you mentioned this to your friends, colleagues and other people in the cancer community.

Sincerely,

Cliff McCloe

www.thedayifoundout.com

Relearning what I thought I already knew

I spent several years of my life as a theatrical improviser. I’ve performed in over 8,000 shows and nearly every one of them had an improvised element to it. That means no script, no net and nothing to rely on but my scene partners and my wits. As improvisers, we regularly take a trivial bit of nothing and attempt to turn it into something wonderful right away. And more often than not, we succeed. So, I thought I knew just about everything I needed to know about being creative. Then I accepted an internship as a copywriter for Copacino + Fujikado and everything I thought I knew go turned on its ear.

Let’s start with what I do know. When people see an improv show skillfully performed, what they are really seeing is a highly focused exercise in agreement. In a nutshell, improvisers agree to agree. Improv guru Keith Johnstone puts it this way: ‘Those who say Yes are rewarded by the adventures they have, and those who say No are rewarded by the safety they attain.’

So, for instance, if I walk out on stage and say to my scene partner, “A major storm she be brewin’, Cap’n”, my partner need only find agreement with the world I’ve created. He might say, “Ay, Wilkins. Ye best batten down the hatches now because the rest of the crew is drunk.” We continue in this way, saying Yes and adding one piece of information at time until the scene is over. What if my partner had blocked my initial offer?: ‘Storm? It’s not raining. And I’m not a Captain, I’m a vacuum cleaner salesman.’ Well the scene would have died right there. So, the more ways we find to agree, the better the scene is. If you and your partners accept everything, then even your mistakes seem intentional and rehearsed. Your only editors are these questions: Does it exist in the world we’ve created? Does it move the story forward?

The thing is, as a greenhorn copywriter, I often don’t know the answer to those two questions. I have to learn that though my twenty word sentence might be brilliant, it won’t exactly fit the transit board on the side of a bus. And while poetic language and meter may be entertaining, it’s not necessarily appropriate for the informational newspaper ad I just wrote. I catch myself trying to be clever when what I should be doing is moving the story forward. Trying to be clever is where I feel safe. And yet what was I spouting about safety earlier?

I hope that soon I’ll figure out again what I supposedly already know: That if I say Yes I will be rewarded with adventure. Time to batten down the hatches.

Quilts are supposed to be for cuddling

ru2hot is a public health education campaign designed to teach men at risk for HIV the signs and symptoms that people get in the first weeks after getting infected (which is known as acute or primary HIV infection). There are now tests that can detect the HIV virus in the first few weeks after infection. The campaign hopes to educate gay men on the symptoms of HIV and to encourage them to get the new test; by doing so the disease is less likely to be spread and the patient is more likely to live longer.

Concept/Copy: Cliff McCloe

Art Directors: Peter Orr, Dwight Battle

For more information about ru2hot, go to ru2hot.org