Fascination Film Studio

11/11/2025

Knowing Otis is a film we've been working on - this is Otis Lee, Jr.

This is his commissioning in the U.S. Army during the Vietnam era. His military service is a relatively small part of his story. But it comes with a funny twist, a self-inflicted mix-up, an attempt to game the system gone awry. That's to share on another day.

Otis has done much in his life.

The first American of African descent to integrate the trust department at Harris Bank in downtown Chicago.

A lawyer with a successful practice in both Philadelphia and Charlottesville.

A businessman with an extensive real estate holding portfolio; a season working at the US Chamber of Commerce; a season with New York Life.

An adjunct professor, who invested in young people alongside his work in law and real estate.

An author (Otis Lee Author) with three books - deeply researched and painstakingly written - scholarly works with a literary tone.

And a husband and father and now grandfather.

I bring him up today, because also - a veteran of the U.S. Army.

Here's to the veterans, and to the legacy that they create through their service.

If we can help you honor a veteran through a legacy film, it would be a tremendous privilege to do so.

🇺🇲

11/09/2025

Just doing a little research. Got a minute to answer a few questions? (They're easy, and fun, and they'd really help with an upcoming speech!

What kind of long-form media do you consume - and how much? Just choose one that is most true from each set of choices.

11/07/2025

The problem is, people just don’t think of Legacy Films as something that everybody does.

Often on birthdays we eat cake and give gifts.
It’s just what we do.

In the social media era, people do gender reveals when they’re having a baby. You don’t have to, but now most people do.

It’s not law to brush your teeth before bed, but you probably do it.

None of that is required, we just do those things.

But when it comes to recording our life stories, it hasn’t been normalized in the same way. Yet.

But that’s changing.

More and more people are doing documentaries to document the work of their business, or community, or family.

People are starting to see that the generations matter. That our lives and the stories of our lives matter.

When you’re ready to tell your story, we can help - even if it’s not to film for you, it might be just a consultation to help get you going.

DMs open if you want to talk.

10/26/2025

Celebrated a year of Fascination Film Studio with a tasty meat cake over the weekend.

🥩 Let me explain: I’m doing 75 Hard right now, which means no sweets.

🎥 Wait, one year? Well, kinda. It’s fuzzy to say what Fascination Films birthday is. On the one hand I have done stuff like this for years. And some of the samples on the website are over five years old. But! It’s been about a year as my sole focus, documentaries at the expense of all else.

🎞️ It’s been a year of *amazing* projects - and an evolution. I can have a tendency to go a mile wide and an inch deep so I was committed to being hyper focused on heritage & legacy documentaries. But I quickly realized that my style of storytelling was in demand for companies and communities too, and wasn’t just for heritage stories.

💰Plus: I needed to be wider in order to like - pay my bills. Past pains made debt the enemy to me, and this bootstrapped business needed me to say yes to things that are still documentary style, but broader than I first imagined.

🛑 I learned right away that I wasn’t going to make commercials or sizzle reels or training videos. I have a bunch of good folks to refer you to if you want that. Because the scope of stories that can be told in a documentary style - micro docs, mini docs, full-on docs - is where I’m good at making people shine.

🙏🏼 I feel so blessed. So grateful. I’m so happy. So many people have said to me, “you’re in the center of your purpose, doing what you were made to do.” I feel like they’re right.

🙌🏼 For everyone whose been part of this year (and all the years before) you have my deepest deepest gratitude.

🎈Up!

10/21/2025

Documentary-style testimonial videos sell in ways that nothing else can. Because they show rather than tell, and they get your customers to speak on your behalf.

Dci Group wanted help telling the story of their work on Replay in Iowa City, one of the premiere student housing facilities in America.

This little testimonial micro-doc was, as production of this kind goes, a nominal expense for a piece of reusable, evergreen content that can go ahead of a sales presentation, be part of a presentation, live on a website or get broken up into clips for social.

It will help potential customers get to know not just what they do, but who they are and how they do it.

A lot of testimonial videos are a person looking at a camera, and that's fine - but I think if you take a little more documentary approach and cinematically show what they're talking about, it's the better way.

It would be hard to watch this and not say, "Yeah, that's the kind of people I want to be doing business with." And I've come to know some of these guys at DCI, and it's all true. They are doing the business of building at the elite level; which doesn't mean eliminating being human and caring, it means being unbelievably good at that, and creating masterpiece places in the process.

If you have a development project that calls for a commercial construction company, you ought to reach out to my friend Wade at DCI. (Message me, I'll connect you.)

If you have a student going to the University of Iowa, Replay is an amazing place for them to live!

If you could use a hand telling your story, that's where I come in.

10/16/2025

Some of what defines us isn't the big pivotal moments, it's these little nuances that are uniquely our own. Like in this short clip of Otis.

Otis Lee Author has written three books (they're great) but in all three, this would be missed.

This is why I love documentary work. It captures those little things - those little unique quirks - perfectly.

Otis is a GREAT orator. He was a lawyer. He composes himself well. He comports himself with dignity. He's a put-together man. He has style. He knows how to use words. And he is so intelligent and so articulate.

When he completes a thought, he begins quietly regrouping himself for what he wants to say next, quietly, under his breath, the microphone catches this endearing little thing, "yes ... yes, yeah yeah yeah yeah..."

He doesn't do it all the time, but he does it enough that it's this hallmark of who he is.

This is a clip from a legacy film that will ensure that his values, his messages - his love - is passed on to his family, and that they'll always have it.

And of course, we will share it with you, too.

If you do a project like this, like if you do something like this on your own, I want you to roll the camera more than you think you should. Don't just turn it on and say 'action' and catch the interview. Catch these small moments.

And even if you're not recording, notice them.

These are some of the most beautiful threads in the fabric that makes us, us.

10/13/2025

Humans are capable of terrible things. And wonderful things. Caleb Altmeyer at Helping Captives is doing hard work that we all wish he didn't have to.

Last week I met Caleb in Dallas - I'm from Iowa, he's from Spokane, Washington.

I wasn't there to record this for him, but I did, because he asked me to. It's the least I could do.

Caleb is a Christian - his parents ran a homeless shelter when he was growing up. He fell away, into drugs, encountered Jesus in a dream, came roaring back to advance the Kingdom of God, and based on what he had experienced and what Jesus showed him in a dream, he's buying a strip club - and turning it into a recovery center for women who have been victims of s*x tr@fficking.

Wild. Bless God.
I wish he didn’t have to do it.

In Memphis, Ben and Jessica Owen have been to very dark places, but they also follow Jesus, and now through We Fight Monsters, they're turning dope houses into Hope Houses - the very places they were once prisoners in.

Wild. Bless God.
I wish they didn’t have to do it.
Wish there wasn't a need.
But there is.

Right here in Cedar Rapids, Iowa, where I live, men are rebuilding their lives after years in prison by rebuilding some of the shelled out houses in our inner city through a ministry called Hope CDA. It’s a beautiful example of what God is up to - always redeeming, restoring.

I’m so glad they’re doing it. I wish they didn’t have to.
But since they do, maybe you can help.

And of course as we work on Killing Kyle Orth, there's another example of God bringing redemption - and an example of His people showing up.

Because so many of you showed up to help fund that film.

Well, causes like Helping Captives, We Fight Monsters and Hope CDA are always in need of people like you to show up and mentor, to show up and donate, to show up and sweep floors or make meals or to do the thing you're good at.

They need that - even when the words, like Caleb's in this video, are so hard to hear.

Especially then.

It's easy to scroll on - you're just a thumb flick away from something else to think about that will feed you dopamines, but instead maybe you'll help, because people need you to.

More in comments.

10/12/2025

“Keep giving tomorrow a chance until tomorrow brings your change.”

- Trent Shelton ()

👆🏼

Something worth turning over in your mind if giving up has entered the chat.

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I felt like I left the Ben Newman bootcamp with a bucket of gold last week. I wanna share a nugget a day for a week or so. It was my incredible honor to be there filming a documentary.

10/11/2025

This week I heard say, “Disappointment has been stolen from our kids.”

This weekend I’m helping with a Middle School lock-in (pray for me) 🤣 at .

The resilience that comes from being faced with disappointment is being intentionally baked into this event for the sake of these kids.

In many ways every kid here is made to feel special, included, loved. As they should.

In others though - there are challenges and one “clan” will win an ice cream party. The majority will not win: a little dish of disappointment, it’s good for them as they grow up.

🏀 I was impressed by the absence policy I got from my son’s basketball coach this week. “An absence is unexcused unless a parent notifies me in advance - or if your son comes to tell me himself; I’d prefer they learn to advocate for themselves.”

When we do everything for our kids, when we try to protect them from every disappointment, we get what we’ve got: the anxiety generation.

Of course we want a stable, supportive, loving environment for our kids - but I think Jesse’s right on this one: we need to let them fail safely sometimes, we need to let them learn to bear up under the weight of disappointment as they grow up, for their sake.

——

I’m sharing nuggets of wisdom each day for a week from the Boot Camp, where I was filming for . For more personal content from me:

10/07/2025

Can I tell you that and lead a heck of a workout?

What would you expect from an Olympic Gold Medalist and a guy who’s coaching some of the best NCAA and Pro athletes - and their coaches?

What impressed me was that crushed the workout and never really broke a sweat. 😅

Unfortunately I don’t think I get *any* of the benefits of the workout by just filming it.

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film.studio doesn’t make workout videos but we do make documentaries about people, and if those people work out it might be part of the film. If those people work out with celebrity trainers, it’s DEFINITELY making the film!

10/06/2025

Filming in Texas - that’s The Texas Rangers stadium, and yes, we are standing on the turf.

The theme today was this: “Your legacy doesn’t start when you die, you’re creating it in how you live, and that includes today.”

This film is going to be special.

They all are - but this one is a first; can’t wait to share more.

10/02/2025

There's just so much to be learned from the elders in our life.

The ones who have more lived experience than we do.

Who have made it through their own hard things.

So many lessons.

Like - Otis Lee Author - he taught me as much off camera as he does through our forthcoming film.

What lessons might the people in your life have for you, if we worked together to unlock them, while there's still time?