I can count on one hand the number of times that I've been most afraid in my life.

One of those times was the night before filming a promotional video in order to raise money to make my first feature film the new norm.

I was so afraid.

I was newer to filmmaking, I was producing it, and the cast crew, almost everybody was completely new to me.

So, hello, I am Laurie Vines.

Thank you for listening.

I've been making films for about six years, and filmmaking is actually an encore career.

I'm a teacher by trade, and when the time was right and I felt like the Lord wanted me to, I jumped in to filmmaking head first.

All of my filmmaking adventures to me have been somewhat miraculous, but I wanna share more about my future film and how God saw me through to a completed project.

First, I wanna take you back a little while.

So several decades ago, after coming to Faith and Christ, someone prayed for me and they shared an encouragement that they felt God had put on their heart.

They told me that God had put a dream in my heart.

Not to limit the dream because of lack of resources or lack of people.

So I knew what dream they were talking about.

They were referring to the dream of filmmaking.

So fast forward several decades, a marriage, three kids, a teaching career, and a whole lot of life stuff, ups and downs, as you know.

And God reminded me of both that dream and that encouragement.

So right before COVID, I had a dream one night and it was a film idea, so I couldn't shake it and really felt like I was supposed to do something with it.

So I stepped out on it and I stepped out of nowhere.

So there were many miracles that saw my future film, 'The New Norm' to its release, but I went to highlight a few.

I think are applicable really to any filmmaker, whether you are just stepping into the field or whether you have done many films.

So I'm gonna highlight three things.

So what does any film need?

The right people, money and timing?

It's a whole lot more than that, but those are three that I wanna refer to when I'm talking about the new norm.

So first timing.

Years ago when I first had the desire to go into filmmaking, I interned and I interned at a local studio in Petersburg, Virginia.

And I just knew it was it.

I was gonna step into filmmaking and that was gonna be the bridge to what God had for me.

It was not so, like I said before, life got busy and years passed by.

Few decades passed by, but it was the right timing when I stepped out into film.

So there's a lot more to this.

That God switched in my life to be able to do it.

But the biggest thing was a job opened up for me to be able to teach from home.

And because of that and because of my amazingly supportive husband, I decided to step out on the feature.

So the second thing that I really needed was people, obviously cast and crew.

Again, I knew almost no one in the industry.

Been a very long time, very, very long time since I interned.

At that film studio, and so I reached out to everyone I knew and I mean everybody.

I knew a lot of people in theater.

I had done some theater work and through that, through a local theater director, he connected me to a friend of mine.

Actually.

We had been in productions together.

His name is David, and unbeknownst to me, he had been working with a local film company with Tyler and with Salt Fire Studio.

So they agreed to film the promotional video.

That's what I started off on talking to you all about, where I was so afraid.

So the good news is the promotional video went well and they were all on board to make 'The New Norm'.

The next one is money.

Money is a big part and peace for everybody, and I have so many testimonies and so many times when I was at the end of my rope and I felt like, okay, God, this is it.

When he came through one time, I literally had no money for the weekend shoot, and God blessed me with someone that gave us a non-interest loan, which we were able to pay back a year later.

And then before our theater premier, someone donated that I did not know through a GoFundMe.

Donated almost the exact amount to be able to host it at our local iconic theater, the Bird Theater.

So since that time, I've done three documentaries.

I've helped on many sets with a lot of different roles.

Please check me out on IMDB.

If you want to collaborate, I'd love to hear from you.

And so God saw the film through.

It's still a miracle to me.

I wanna thank you all that have listened.

Thank you, faith and Family Filmmakers, podcasts, and wanna encourage you all to keep going.

We need the right story, people, money, but really most of all, we need God and his timing and his wisdom.

So I continue to pray about which projects to do and to be a part of, and he's always faithful, so I can't think of a greater time or medium to spread goodness.

Beauty and truth, so God bless you in your filmmaking adventures.