We’ve had such a positive response to the episodes of Spirit Life we wanted to give everyone an opportunity to go behind the scenes with the CR Spirits.
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We’ve been talking about it for a while but we’ve never really let on what Spirits Pizza is all about. Well, I can tell you that it’s really not pizza. But we think it’s something that is better for you than pizza.

I’m not quite sure how it all came about. Tiffany and I talk almost every day. Sometimes the topics can be pretty varied. Usually it consists of me picking on Tiffany and her laughing at me. But from time to time, we do have serious discussions. The last few months they’ve been occurring with increasing frequency. I’m sure Tiffany will have the whole conversation transcribed and filed away in that magic color coded filing cabinet of hers!
Anyway, we talked about the next level for both of us and somewhere in the conversation, Spirits Pizza was born.

So just what the hell is Spirits Pizza? It’s simple. It’s what Tiffany and I do best. She dances, I point a camera at stuff. So I can finally tell you that Spirits Pizza is all about bringing Tiffany’s dance style online.

Starting December first, you’ll be able to learn the same routines that the Spirits pro team perform. Only we’re putting them online. So if you’re just looking for something different to stay in shape or a dance studio looking to infuse a new style, Spirits Pizza will deliver.

So how did we come up with the name Spirits Pizza? Well, most companies while they’re developing a new product assign it a project name. That way, you can talk about the project without tipping your hand as to what it really is.

I mean can you imagine if you sat down at a cafe in California and heard Steve Jobs talking about the iPhone 5? It’s never going to happen. So Spirits Pizza served actually a couple purposes. One, Tiffany and I could talk about it without really letting on what we were working on. Another was if you think about it, what we’re doing is really like a pizza business. We’re “serving up” a “slice” of the CR Spirits and we’re giving you” Hot Home Delivery.” So Spirits Pizza sounded like a good project name while we were working out all the details.

But Spirits Pizza is a lot more than learning routines online. We still have a few things up our sleeves!

One of them we worked on this weekend.

The sad thing is that it really showed Tiffany’s jealous streak. Tiffany jealous you say? Oh yeah!

I made the mistake of telling Paulette how awesome this one shot of her looked. The next take, this is what happened…

Sad isn’t it? It’s something we’ll have to work on.

So when I was filming Ashleigh this morning, I kept my mouth shut and was able to get some shots like this before Tiffany found out what we were up to!

Actually the shoot is for a little something we call Desserts Pizza. See if you can figure it out.

But if you haven’t signed up for our email list, please do so. We’ll send you a free Spirits Pizza routine just for giving us your email address. How do we do that you ask? Well, you can go HERE at crspirits.com and enter your name and email on the note that Tiffany stuck to the page and we’ll do the rest.

Tiffany and I are really excited about this venture and we have so many things in store for you. We’ll let you in on those the closer we get to opening the doors.

So for now, I’ll leave you with another shot from filming this morning before Tiffany found out the camera wasn’t pointed at her!

In the meantime, I’ll work on trying to get Tiffany to share the camera. I’m sure my work is cut out for me!

And just so she doesn’t get in and delete this post, I better put up at least one more picture of her.

Spirits Pizza is closer than ever to opening its doors. Tiffany and I had a great meeting this past weekend and we’ve come up with some ideas that have even surprised us!

If you want to find out what we have cooking up our sleeve or just want to find out what the heck Spirit Pizza even is all about then please take a moment to join our mailing list.

At the end of the video below there will be a form that you can enter your name and email address to be placed on the list for news all about Spirits Pizza. We’ll be opening the doors before you know it so sign up now and you won’t miss a beat.

Well, it’s been a while again since the last update but a lot has been going on behind the scenes.

The most exciting thing is that Tiffany and I are embarking on a joint venture called Spirits Pizza. We’ve done a lot of research, we’ve gone over crossing all the T’s and dotting all the I’s. There’s been a lot of work going on to make this happen in the very near future.

While we’re not quite ready to roll Spirits Pizza out to the world, I can tell you that if you’re a fan of the Spirits, you may be interested in a pizza or two that we’ll have to offer.

We’re still working out all the details but as you can see in the picture below, I have Tiffany hard at work on this project!!

So what does this mean for the documentary? Nothing really. I’ll be asking people who knew Tiffany when she was growing up for interviews and we’ll keep piecing it all together. But Spirits Pizza has certainly turned the heat on the film down a bit. I’m not abandoning the film or anything like that but Spirits Pizza has the potential to open up some things for us that will allow me to take the film beyond what I had first envisioned for it.

You can still find me at the Spirits studio every Wednesday evening filming Tiffany and the team. Not for the documentary though. I’m filming for something else that you’ll be able to see shortly. So far, everyone that’s been filled in on the details is pretty excited about it. We hope you will be too.

There’s a lot of things coming in the future that are in store for fans of Tiffany and the Spirits.

I’ll leave you with this picture for you to ponder just what exactly Tiffany has up her sleeve!

Before I get into how evil Tiffany really is I want to talk a bit about the Spirits final performance of the season and the End of Season Party.

I always get asked questions about what the Spirits are really like behind the scenes. I get asked even more often if I need any help carrying my film gear or holding a reflector. So, I thought maybe it would be kind of fun to give you a behind the scenes peek inside the Spirits locker room at the Kernels game. Are you ready? No turning back once we get going here.

Still with me? Ok, here we go…

Here’s Lucy brazenly trying to knock down a “turkey feather” in her hair that just won’t lie down.

Discussing the merits of different conditioners to avoid split ends.

Deatra trying to figure out who picked her name in the gift exchange.

And if there’s a camera around, posing for pictures.

They’ve done almost 70 events so by this time in the season, they’ve got everything down. So it’s just relax and visit until it’s time to go on.

This year was a little different than the party I attended last year. The Spirits had one last performance at the Kernels game so Tiffany surprised everyone by getting a suite at the stadium to host their party.

Well, it was SUPPOSED to be a surprise. But of course Tiffany wanted everything to be as perfect as possible and it was pretty much impossible not to spot her clear across the stadium. So all the girls knew what was going on before Tiffany could surprise them.

It had been a couple weeks since the pro team had had practiced but you’d never know it from their performances. They were on top of their game as always.

They did something different this time around though. Normally the Spirits dance before the game starts. But this time they danced after the first and second innings. I think it was a great opportunity for a lot more people to see what the Spirits are all about. From my vantage point I could really hear that the crowd was loving the performances.

You know I’ve watched the routines this year probably hundreds of times in practices and different performances but it never gets old or stale. It’s always great to see the Spirits perform.

And as quickly as the performance started, it was over and the Spirits had performed their last performance of the season. Where did the time go?

With the season over, it was time to relax, celebrate and have fun.

So how does all this tie in with Tiffany being evil personified? Well, let me tell you what she did and see if you don’t agree that there’s evil hiding behind that smile.

This is my last year filming Tiffany and the team for the documentary I’ve been working on about her life. Tiffany and I have become great friends and will always remain so. But all good things must come to an end.
While we still haven’t talked about it, for this project, there’s no need for me to return next year.

Of course I’d love to come back but I don’t want to just be sitting in the corner with my camera filming the team if there’s no goal in mind. Wednesdays have become days that I’ve looked forward to and I will certainly miss them. As much as I consider the team part of my extended family I need to be doing something creative.

So what does Tiffany do? She has a shirt designed with not only the incredible image of the Spirits in Tiger makeup which Jes did a fantastic job of creating, added CR Spirits Professional Dance Team my company name, Silver Phoenix Films Nature and Wildlife on the front. THEN she added “Railsback Presents Kevin’s Kingdom Wild & Sexy Spirits” on the back!

So what’s so evil about that? Nothing really, it was an incredibly touching thing she did. I’m not one to take compliments easily and for her to do that meant so much to me.
Oh, and she had shirts made for every team member.

But here comes the evil part…

She’s having the returning team that doesn’t have to try out wear that shirt for next seasons tryouts! So how can I not come back and film that?

So don’t let that smile fool you. Cause once she lets you in, you’re not gonna get out!

Tiffany surprised everyone this past Wednesday by announcing that this would be the final practice of the Season.

It’s hard to believe that the season is coming to a close. Seems that tryouts were just a few months ago. Now another season has passed.

The good news is that the break gives Tiffany and I an opportunity to discuss the future. We’ve been kicking around a lot of ideas but whether we can make them work or not is yet to be determined.

Even though the season for the pro team is wrapping up, I still have footage to shoot of people who have known Tiffany in all stages of her life. So Fall will still be a busy one for me as far as getting the last of the footage I need to tell her story. Then comes the edit.

We also have on our discussion agenda if I’ll be coming back next year at all. There are a lot of stories that could be told I think. We’ll have to see. Tiffany has become a close friend and the girls are like an extended family. I’ve enjoyed my Wednesday with them. So not being there certainly would make me sad.

On another sad note, Emily will not be returning next year. She’s hoping to add another addition to her family but she wanted to dance one more year.
I am happy to say though mission accomplished as far as Emily goes. Here’s a shot of her smiling!

So if I’ve accomplished nothing else, I’ve captured Emily smiling.

The Spirits had two shows this year. Show one was the show most often performed. They did have a couple special routines for Tiff’s Birthday Bash and her daughter Crystal’s graduation. But show one was the one they pretty much performed all season long.

So on the last night of this seasons practice, they did show two one more time. None of the routines from the shows will be coming back next year so if you missed them this year, you’re out of luck if you wanted to catch them next season.

So here’s some raw footage of just one routine from show two. The Spirits are second to none.

[See post to watch Flash video]

I’ll keep you posted on the films progress and where we go from here. I’ll know in a few weeks if I’ll be back or if last Wednesday practice was our swan song. I hope not.

Well, another Spirit season is almost over. Next month Tiffany will hold tryouts for the next Spirits season and the cycle will start all over again.

It’s hard to believe I’ve filmed them for two seasons now. For the most part they pretty much ignore the camera and they’re not afraid to talk about anything while I’m there. We’ve earned that level of trust between each other.

But now I need to be focusing on Tiffany’s story. That’s what this documentary needs to be about, Tiffany. So I have a lot of interviews to do with people who know Tiffany from the beginning to now. I need to visit the places she’s been and most of all I need to really sit down and talk to Tiffany and get her story from her perspective.

Since this film is about Tiffany’s story I really could have wrapped the filming of the team a long time ago. But like anything the story I wanted to tell kept evolving and being refined.
The judges at the CR Film Festival though gave me the best advice. Make it short, tell a story and makes us care.

So that means a lot of what was originally planned had to be cut and pieces of the revised stories were trimmed away as well. What is left is all Tiffany. So in reality for this story I didn’t really need to put the girls through all this trouble with a camera in their face every Wednesday.

I know Tiffany jokes that I’ll never stop filming them but I’m sure they’re ready for a break from me and want to go back to how it used to be.

I’ll probably film one more round of interviews with the girls and then I think they can finally be free of me.

Then comes the arduous task of going through all the footage to find just those right shots. I have a shelf full of hard drives and each hard drives contains hours and hours of Spirit footage. I’ve found a great database that I can put in all the footage and find the shot I’m looking for quite easily once everything is logged.

Currently Tiffany and some of the team are in Orange County California where they performed at the OC Fair Saturday. I’m sure they knocked their Birkenstocks off with their performance. The Spirits are like no other dance team I can tell you that.

So, is this the end of the road? I know Tiffany and I need to sit down when she gets back from California and have a long serious talk about where the Spirits are going and if I’m going to be there to lend some sort of hand where I can.

So we’ll see where we go from here.

I have a new venture starting up very soon called Filmmaking Naturally. It’s still under wraps for the moment but hopefully when it launches it’ll spread it’s wings and take off to allow me to pursue other dreams.

I know what other dreams could be better than filming a bakers dozen or so of incredibly talented, extremely beautiful dancers? Most people would say I was nuts.

I do know that this is probably the one of very few non nature and wildlife related projects I’ll ever do. My true love has and always will be nature. I’m been deeply troubled for a very long time by the way we’ve treated our wildlife and our planet. From canned lion hunts, killing entire packs of wolves, destroying the rainforest. It weighs heavily on me and grows heavier by the day.

I’ve wondered for a long time about my destiny. We all wonder what our purpose in life is. A Shaman once told me that in my heart I already knew. I just had to figure it out.

That view is coming closer and closer into focus. And I’m not sure if I can do what will be asked of me. I guess time will tell.

But I guess I kind of digressed there for a bit.

Tiffany has become a very close friend. I know I can depend on her for anything and I hope she feels the same. If this is my last season with the Spirits, I know our friendship will continue and grow.

So stay tuned…

In June Oprah Winfrey announced a competition to be the next talk show star on her new network OWN.

I didn’t know anything about it but Tiffany called me all excited about the opportunity. We talked for a bit and decided to get together and shoot some footage to submit.

So, I set up a background, put up some lights and Tiffany came over and we shot some footage. We kept rolling until we both felt there was enough to put together a good submission.

Now, the original idea was to talk about Tiffany, the dance studio and the Spirits. But after reading the rules of the contest pretty much everything we had planned on doing for our entry wasn’t allowed.

You couldn’t mention your business, couldn’t show any logos. The only music allowed was what they provided for your use. Pretty much everything we wanted to do we couldn’t because the rules forbid us from doing so.

So, I sat on the footage for a while and just tried to figure out if there was something we could use or if we would have to rethink the whole idea and come up with something else. I read and reread the rules trying to figure out what exactly they were looking for. I discovered that it’s actually a contest to pick contestants for a reality show where one by one potential talk show hosts would be eliminated until finally the last one left would get a show on OWN.

Some contestants would be picked by the number of votes their entry received. Others would be picked by the producers. The way the voting was set up is you could vote as many times as you wanted to. So, I knew to not even bother trying to go that route. People will enlist friends, family and probably pay people to sit on their computers all day and click to vote running up unnaturally high numbers of votes. To me, that’s not really indicative of how great your entry really is. It just tells me that you have no life and can sit on the computer all day and vote for yourself. Sure you’ll get picked to be a part of the reality show but it’s not my style and I know it’s not Tiffany’s.

Reading the rules a little further I discovered that there was a possibility that they could love your show idea but if they didn’t like you, they could just give your show idea to someone else. So you might have the greatest show idea ever but if they don’t think you can carry the show, they’ll give it to someone else.

So I figured it really wasn’t so much about what your show idea was but about the personality of the entrant.

Now as hard as it is to believe, I actually thought even further. Yeah I know, kind of a rarity for me. But I thought about the number of talk shows that come and go. The format is really pretty much the same no matter what the subject matter etc. I mean it’s a talk show. You can shuffle the parts, but in the end, it’s a host talking to a guest. So it really comes down to the hosts personality if a talk show makes it or not. I came to the conclusion that whatever we did, it had to really show off Tiffany’s true personality.

So let’s recap for a moment. No mention of the CR Spirits is allowed. No logos. No music other than what they provide and to top it all off, showcase Tiffany’s personality in a way that will set her apart from the other entries.

So I went over the footage. Then I went over it some more and then some more. Even though you can edit different takes together it’s always better to have one clean take from start to finish. Well, I quickly discovered that we didn’t have that. What I did discover was that I found myself laughing at all the outtakes we had shot. See, I learned long ago that with Tiffany you need to keep the camera rolling because you never know when you’ll get that one moment where all the stars align and you get that perfect take. So when she would stumble on a take I just kept the camera rolling.

So after watching the footage over and over I realized that I had captured Tiffany’s personality but it was in all the bloopers. So, what to do? I started laying down all the different bloopers and after a few minutes I realized that I might finally be on to something. I wasn’t quite sure how Tiffany was going to feel about submitting all her mistakes instead of a polished piece but I really felt it captured her essence. Luckily, she liked it too.

In the end, who knows if she’ll get picked or not but the important thing is she tried. I think we showcased her real personality and her entry stands apart from pretty much everyone else’s. Not because we submitted her worst footage when everyone else submitted their best but because it was honest. Anyone can capture your attention when they know the camera is rolling. Tiffany captivates even when she thinks the camera isn’t rolling. Who do you think would make the better talk show host? My money’s on Tiffany!

She got over a thousand views and votes and she didn’t get them by sitting at her computer voting for herself night after night. In my book, that already makes her a winner!

Wanna see her entry?

Let us know what you think…

[See post to watch Flash video]

I’ve been doing a lot of thinking lately about the film. I’ve come to the conclusion that this really needs to be two and possibly even three films. The judges at CRIFF this year were pretty specific in what they were looking for in a documentary. We want it short, we want you to tell a story and we want to care. I had an opportunity to talk to them specifically about the Spirits documentary. Everyone agreed that there were many great stories there to be told but exploring them all would dilute the message of the main story.

So, I was faced with a couple choices. the first would mean that I was essentially done filming the team and I needed to focus just on Tiffany. I pretty much threw that one out because I think there’s still a great story about the team that needs to be told on it’s own.

The second choice was to keep filming the team and start working on a plan to do a second film that goes in a different direction than the first. This would require a lot more filming but would allow me to focus on other stories about the Spirits.

Although I haven’t talked to Tiffany about it yet I’m leaning towards doing two films. This would allow me to focus on specific storylines without diluting the main focus of each film.

I think we’re finally getting to the point with practices that we can start upping the filming game plan. The girls have worked really hard to get the routines cleaned and I think we’re almost to the point where we can start getting some specific shots down. Ultimately, it’s all up to Tiffany. She has to make the call when we can start to deviate a bit from the current status quo.

In other news, I took home another award. This time from the Iowa Motion Picture Association. It’s the first time I’ve ever entered anything in this competition. Sp, it was certainly nice to be recognized for my cinematography. It was really something to know that my little film was able to stand alongside a multi-million dollar film.

In the end, I think it all comes down to passion that separates you from the rest of the pack. I think that is what ultimately separates the Spirits from other dance teams. Other dance teams may be as talented, they may have the best choreographers, they may be in a better geographic locations. But the Spirits have passion and that’s something you can’t buy, teach or relocate to get.