Bass Edge News

Producer's work is never done

I remember a quote from one of the Coen Brothers, the writer/director pair responsible for several acclaimed films including No Country For Old Men, Blood Simple, and Raising Arizona. They had just released Fargo, which would go on to win best picture that year, and a reporter asked them, “How do you know when you’re done with the writing process and ready to move to production?” Their response was simple – “We’re never done, we just run out of time.”

I believe that quote applies to anyone involved in creation of a product. In a round about way, I think it applies to anglers too. From a production standpoint, our “just one more tweak” mentality is reflected in the pleading “just one more cast” we hear countless times from anglers as the sun slides below the horizon. And just as the field crew rolls their eyes each time those words are spoken, I’m sure the powers that be at the television networks do the same as we explain to them why it was absolutely necessary to wait until the last possible day to submit our finished shows.

That is what leads me to today. It’s currently 8 a.m., and as soon as this article is done, I’ll perform one last watch and tweak on our first four television shows for Season Three before they ship out the door to The Outdoor Channel. The great thing about being executive producer on Bass Edge is that I get to do a little bit of everything. Lucky for me, I’m surrounded by a talented crew so passionate and capable in their own tasks, that I know “tweaks” are all I’m going to have to worry about from day to day.

By the way, did I mention how incredible Season Three is going to be? Of course, some may say that as a producer, I’m a bit biased. However, as our first shows prepares to ship, I find myself more excited about Bass Edge than anytime in the past. Our move to The Outdoor Channel was at the perfect time to freshen things up. You’ll find a brand new opening for the show, new graphics, new music, better audio and dozens of other improvements. Of course, none of that would help if we weren’t constantly improving upon our primary mission: to provide an educational and entertaining outlet for anglers in expanding their knowledge of the sport, and hopefully, catch more and bigger fish as an end result. This season we deliver on that in spades. Denny Brauer, Scott Suggs, Randy Howell, Boyd Duckett and over a dozen other phenomenal anglers are with us to help explain how and why they do what they do. We also managed to choose the highest-gas-price period in history to travel across the country to California, but seeing the end results, it was worth every dime. You’ll see13 new shows this year, and trying to narrow the excitement down to 22 minutes per episode has been a chore.

Lucky for us and our viewers, the extra knowledge gained with each angler isn’t entirely left on the cutting room floor. We get as much information out of each co-host as possible in our time together and you’ll find plenty of expanded content all year long on our Web site, in our video tips, through the podcast, and even as bonus content on our season DVD sets.

That leads me to part two of my day at Bass Edge headquarters. With our first four shows reviewed and being prepped for output, I’ll be moving over to final tweaks on our new web site design. We’ve taken feedback from visitors and a big chunk of our own wish list and completely overhauled the site. Come January, you’ll find a fresh new look, easier navigation, and plenty of additional content to help give you the angling edge. In fact, just about every part of Bass Edge is getting a nice polish and some cool updates for 2009 including the podcast and our newsletter.

Now for those of you still with me, I need to mention one more very important factor. Bass Edge wouldn’t be possible without our viewers, readers and listeners. We read every e-mail and listen to every voice mail received even if we don’t have time to respond to all of them. Your constant feedback is a large part of what shapes Bass Edge’s future direction. Thanks to your input, you’ll find plenty of new lakes in Season Three, more information on pond and river fishing, and even new products being introduced to our store that tackle specific subjects in detail. So continue to send those e-mails on what you would like to see in the future and together we’ll work to shape Bass Edge into an information resource we can all be proud of and find useful.

It’s Friday, and although I would love nothing more than to tweak away on this article for the remainder of the morning, I’m afraid there’s a new podcast to review, video tips to compress, four new shows to deliver and a bit less exciting, budgets to review. Did I mention that next week we meet to discuss anglers, lakes, and topics for 2010? But I’m not complaining, I love it here at Bass Edge, and as 2009 approaches I wish to thank all of our incredible camera operators, editors, writers, web programmers, staff members, sponsors and viewers for making my job that much more enjoyable throughout 2008.

So as the Coen brothers put it over 10 years ago, I may not feel done, but I am out of time. And that’s a good thing, because without deadlines, we might just tweak on forever. Perhaps that’s a note we need to pass along to Guns N Roses who just spent 14 years delivering their new album. Can anyone get me Axl’s e-mail address?