Joe Swanberg Quotes

When you don't know what to do, try something; if that doesn't work, try something else.

My directing style has changed over the years. I allow things to breathe a lot more.

Take a method and try it. If it fails, admit it frankly, and try another. But by all means, try something.

One thing is sure. We have to do something. We have to do the best we know how at the moment... If it doesn't turn out right, we can modify it as we go along.

You know, the whole philosophy of ad hoc combinations has its strengths and its weaknesses.

We must improvise, and we must experiment, and we must do things that might go wrong, and everything we bring - the people and the equipment - must serve us in that goal.

My idea of artistry has always been 'try everything until you find out what works.'

Doing a scene is like opening a bottle. If it doesn't open one way, try another - perhaps even give it up for another bottle?

I like to leave a little room to innovate and change things around while I'm working.

You have to sometimes just run with the problem rather than trying to solve it with hi-tech wizardry and lots of planning.

I don't mind trying it out and making sure something seems to work well.

When you feel you have good although incomplete expertise, start trying things. If it's not working, try something else; maintain an experimental mindset.

That without experimentation, a willingness to ask questions and try new things, we shall surely become static, repetitive, moribund.

The important thing to remember, if you are trying something that is an innovation, is not to think too much about it. Because if you take too long, by the time you get there, the world will have changed. You take a risk, and if it doesn't work, you make a change. We are not betting our lives on it.

A good director's not sure when he gets on the set what he's going to do.

It's very much like filmmaking always is-you're always asked to do something that you're not sure you know how to do. So you make an educated guess as to what you think will work and you hope between that and plan B, that you can end up with a product that's really good.

I just find things that work and embellish them.

My methodology is not knowing what I'm doing and making that work for me.

We go in and I do my thing, and then we supplement it with whatever we want.

I film quite a bit of footage, then edit. Changes before your eyes, things you can do and things you can't. My attitude is always 'let it keep rolling.'

Part of being innovative in government is sometimes not trying to plot out the last chapter of the book, but to be open and see what comes back.

A lot of my work is a matter of reacting to surprises in life.

As soon as you know what you're doing, you're doing it wrong.

For me, I'd rather be the inventive one, and if something doesn't work, I'll go back to the workshop, put it on the bench, and pound on it for awhile.

For me, the movie's always evolving as I'm doing it. I throw things in as we shoot, and I take things out as we go. I want to create a whole life and then select the pieces that best sort of describe it later, you know? So there's a lot of wastage when I make a film.