Interview

Episode 135 – Creative Collaborations in FerroCity with Joe Scacciaferro

In this episode Mark interviews Joe Scacciaferro who has been in the media and entertainment business for over 30 years, has founded and run several successful media and entertainment production and technical support companies, most noticeably FerroProductions, and is behind the collaborative platform FerroCity.

Prior to the interview, Mark shares some comments from recent episodes, a personal update, and a word from this episode’s sponsor, Findaway Voices.

You can learn more about how you can get your work distributed to retailers and library systems around the world at starkreflections.ca/Findaway.

In the interview Mark and Joe talk about:

  • How story has always been important in Joe’s life, and how that sometimes backfired when he was a young child
  • The way that everything is a story, and the more that we are comfortable with story, the better we can engage with others
  • Joe’s musical background, and how story through music was one of his first loves and felt natural to him
  • The prominence of unplanned transitions in Joe’s life
  • How it can be ALL about the journey
  • Different types of collaborations that creative storytellers can work on together in music verses prose writing
  • The critical nature of music and how it impacts a visual storytelling medium
  • The different types of documentary projects that Joe has worked on over the years
  • Fascinating answers you can get from some basic simple questions
  • The critical balance of skill combined with a solid community
  • How everything you learn is important to everything you do
  • The way that the collaborative community of FerroCity is the culmination of Joe’s entire career
  • How the platform FerroCity helps connect the community together and learn from the way people engage with it
  • How writers who are interested in checking it out can begin to participate in the FerroCity community and platform
  • Why Joe says that you can’t learn anything unless it’s entertaining
  • The three phases of FerroCity that are being rolled out the spring/summer of 2020
  • Why Mark calls this platform a type of “Field of Dreams”
  • How a team can synergize over a single posting on a platform like this
  • The camaraderie that comes from working alongside other team members

After the interview, Mark reflects on the universal nature of storytelling, and the unimagined and unforeseen benefits that can result from creative collaboration.

Links of Interest:

Joe Scacciaferro has been in the media and entertainment business for over 30 years and has founded and run several successful media and entertainment production and technical support companies, most noticeably FerroProductions.

He has been honored with 5 Emmys, 9 Emmy nominations, co-authored 15 books on the creative use of music technology, written music scores for broadcast programming, produced dozens of network sports shows / documentaries and been honored with two super bowl rings from the NY Giants for his programming efforts during the past 20 years.

Joe’s creative abilities are self-evident based on the longevity and diverse successes of his career. But when asked about his single greatest professional accomplishment, he will always point to enormous career successes of his interns.

He is a strong believer in creative collaboration, and networking opportunities, and he shares an exciting new project called FerroCity, which represents the culmination of his extraordinary career and life.


The introductory, end, and bumper music for this podcast (“Laser Groove”) was composed and produced by Kevin MacLeod of www.incompetech.com and is Licensed under Creative Commons: By Attribution 3.0

1 thought on “Episode 135 – Creative Collaborations in FerroCity with Joe Scacciaferro”

  1. I like that while this is Stark Reflections on writing and publishing it is all kinds of writing and publishing. The FerroCity looks great for screen writers and people trying to get into the movie and tv industry.

    I am a little worried about how they are going to teach production when every production company in the world is closed right now. But then again they are trying to crowd source the niche movie industry master apprentice training. So maybe it will be just as simple as start this way since everyone has a phone that records video and with community expertise you can distance learn.

    Mark, you talked about how good collaboration is when creating your video. I feel that it is the one thing that most authors don’t do. When you write for tv or for movies it is usually a writer’s room that gets credit. Everyone is bouncing ideas off each other to get the best script you can to shoot. It is counter to the “great american writer” who hides in his cabin and cranks out the amazing novel with just himself and nature around him.

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