Reading time: 6 – 10 minutes

This post is the gathering of a number of ideas I’ve been collecting over the past few weeks. I’ve put them all here to begin getting your feedback.

A word on ideas, a business executive said:

If you need validation, look in the mirror. Business has no set rules. You’re only as good as what you’ve created next.

Think of yourself as a lumberjack in the Redwood Forest. If you’re focused only on knocking that tree down, you wont last in that career. If you focus on the process and enjoy the chopping, you will thrive.

In truth, you may or may not knock down the tree, but you have to enjoy the process. At the end of it all, you’ll be back where you started, hitting up a new tree.

I want to make a change to that statement. The only rule in business is keeping within a framework of that is pleasing to Allah.

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Few weeks back I started a 3 x 10 idea generation discipline (three ideas for ten days). I did keep with the discipline but I had difficulty posting it on the due to traveling and not always having access to the internet.

The following are my ideas so far:

• Produce a documentary about NYPD cops that are Muslim. Tell their story of fitting in with the other cops. Dealing with their own diverse back grounds and Muslim identity and facing danger at times for the protection of innocent people.

• Produce an online video series that in an entertaining way address the issue of calendar holidays. For example, Valentines day: Its pagan roots, the legend of the Valentine card – a priest who married soldiers to women which was against the empires wishes and resulted in his death and a note to a woman who took care of him in his tortured state. Series would address the affect of these holidays on our culture and Islamic well being.

• Refocus Tufaan to address not so much the hurricane, but the overall human struggle and adjust the artistic approach of the movie to something more eye candy such as motion graphics.

• Produce an animated feature documentary about the last years of Malcolm X’s life as a Muslim (post hajj)

• Develop an online learning system for new Muslim converts where they can go from A – Z and be up to speed on what they need to know to be totally functional in their deen.

• Produce a movie guerrilla style for under $30,000 starring local youth.

• Produce a low to mid-budget ($50,000 – $500,00) motion graphics based movie covering the story of the Israel-Palistine conflict starting from 1900 – Present time. Story would cover the Fall of the Ottoman Empire, the establishment of Middle Eastern states,  Involvement of British and French in turning Muslims against each other, Establishment of Israel to the Palestine-Israel conflict.

• Produce a short video for online distribution based off of the letter of Umar ibn Abdil Azeez that was passed out in the Torch Bearer’s seminar.

• Develop a Qabeelah training module within Message Mastery. Think AlMaghrib’s teacher training system by sensei on steroids.

• Produce a “docu-lecture” – Every since I saw “Legend of the Furious Five” (extra DVD from Kung-Fu Panda) I got excited about producing a lecture DVD that’s designed to be on video. Imagine recording a Halaqa studio-cinematic style with short stories cutting in and out of the lecture visuals. Its almost like two paralel stories…sort of.

• Secure a partnership with a national or international client that specializes in educating people in the area of deen, language, self development or halaal financial mastery and launch an online learning system that is subscription based and membership focused.

• Produce a short film titled “Sunnah Smile” for the purposes of laying out a case study for Message Mastery students. A story about a little girl that gets bullied on her way to school. Bully always takes her lunch money. She tries to confront the big bully but ends up in the trash. She follows up with a new plan which leads to a flowery twist ending.

• Incorporate Leechon in Canada so that it can take advantage of the money that the Canadian government has laid out for film projects. The questions that come to mind are: (1) What are Canadian business tax-laws? (2) What are the different ownership structures? (3) What are the different type of banks that are available and what sort of fees and benefits do they offer? (4) What are the different types of government grants that are available and how does one go about getting them? (5) Where can I go to learn more about the business of film in Canada?

• Contract a professional graphic designer to produce a course focused on graphic design and its principles for Message Mastery.

• Produce a short film titled “License on Empty” about a young kid who gets a drivers license and goes partying everywhere. He runs out of gas and ends up having to by for gas, maintainance as well as insruance – learning about responsibilty.

• Produce a promotional “profile video” of each AlMaghrib instructor.

• Produce a movie that documents the journey going cross country with Tufaan screening it in every major city in North America.

• Start an education campaign with some organization meant to educate people on zakah and wealth building.

• Produce an adventure-horror-thriller – Story about three guys going mountain biking in the smoky mountains in North Carolina. One of the guys disappears, another guy gets hurt and their vehicles wont start, leaving them stranded in the mountains. They soon realize there is more to their predicament than meets the eye. Story of survival.

• Produce a TV Show titled “Brown-tourage – brown people doing funny stuff. A project that starts off with funny skits that start off online, which ultimately lead to a feature film.

• Scavenger-Hunt – Reality show race. Three teams, each with a camera. A race to the finish line and collection of items.

• Sci-Fi Film – The human race of one planet has declared war on the human race of another planet. They intercept communication from the “enemy” nation and use their computers to try to decipher the message. According to computer analysis, “This communication (Quranic ayat) couldn’t have been done by a human.”

• Short film – “License On Empty” – Young kid just gets his licenese, goes partying everywhere. Gas runs out and ends up stranded in the middle of nowhere. In the end learns a valuable lesson of self responsibility.

• Develop a few online seminars that can be sold for cheap

• Write a few e-books as a means of testing future markets

• Develop a profile video for each AlMaghrib instructor

• Make a movie about a road-trip distribution of another movie through major cities within North America.

• Produce a film with Bayyinah about the story of three people and their journey of learning to read Arabic in 16 hrs.
• Produce a film with AlMaghrib students which would fundamentally be a compilation of many short film put together as a feature.

• Make a video climbing the Pyramids of Giza sticking a poster sized sticker at the top saying “Belal Was Here {date}”

• Take a trip to Australia with multiple stops in Texas, Cali, Hawaii, Malaysia and finally Australia via first class. For every stop, record a time-lapse of a masjid in the local area.

• Produce a film An Inconvienent Truth style but instead of global warming as the problem being address, it can be the issue of people’s financial issues and the person addressing the issue can be sensei.

• Setup every major masjid in North America with screening equipment to layout the foudation for an independent distribution network for Leechon (projects, screen, speakers)

Reading time: 2 – 2 minutes

A friend of mine forwarded me an email with a pretty cool guide for home-made sound effects:
http://www.epicsound.com/sfx/

Sound designer David Filskov posts an interesting list of tricks he’s collected from other designers for turning common objects into audio trickery. It seems like a stretch, until you realize that movie soundtracks are rarely recorded from the source—often because doing so would be dangerous, impractical, or wouldn’t sound believable.

The sound of people walking on snow? It’s made by recording people in the studio walking on flour or cornstarch. If you live in a cold, snowy climate, you know how rare that perfectly crunchy and squeaky snow is. The sound of a naval depth charge? A toilet flushing at half speed, with a reverberation filter applied. Alien sounds?

Certain kinds of canned dog food make useful sounds as the food comes out of the can. The chunky stuff isn’t so good, but the tightly packed all-one-mass kind makes gushy sucking sounds when the air on the outside of the can is sucked into the can to replace the exiting glob of dog food. This sound can be used as an element in certain kinds of monster vocalizations, alien pod embryo expulsions, etc.

3 x 10 :: Day 06

• Produce a promotional “profile video” of each AlMaghrib instructor.  

• Produce a movie that documents the journey going cross country with Tufaan screening it in every major city in North America. 

• Start an education campaign with some organization meant to educate people on zakah and wealth building.

What’s this “3 x 10? thing? – See my post on focusing ideas:
http://www.leechon.com/focus-ideas-847.htm

Reading time: 2 – 4 minutes

Back in January I made a post about the IMAX film “Journey to Mecca”. I hope you had the opportunity to watch it.

I remember when I went to see the film when it was test screened, it was the first time I actually cried in a movie. The images on the IMAX are extremely moving. Reliving the hajj on the screen was as very strong moment and I’m sure those who have gone to hajj and saw the film can surely relate.

A sad moment during the film was right before the credits, when it said, “In memory of Chems Eddine Zinoun” who was the actor that played Ibn Batuta in this film. According to IMDB, Zinoun died in Casablanca, Morroco due to a tragic car accident in November 2008.

At first the thought was sad, but then on a deeper note I thought to myself,

He died at a great time where his last project was something that will resonate through time as calling people to fulfill their last pillar of Islam. When he stands up on the day of judgement, he can say to Allah-swt that this was a legacy that he left.

May Allah-swt count this project on his scale of good deeds on the day of judgement.

The following video is one the making of “Journey to Mecca”

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3 x 10 :: Day 05

• Incorporate Leechon in Canada so that it can take advantage of the money that the Canadian government has laid out for film projects. The questions that come to mind are: (1) What are Canadian business tax-laws? (2) What are the different ownership structures? (3) What are the different type of banks that are available and what sort of fees and benefits do they offer? (4) What are the different types of government grants that are available and how does one go about getting them? (5) Where can I go to learn more about the business of film in Canada?

• Contract a professional graphic designer to produce a course focused on graphic design and its principles for Message Mastery.

• Produce a short film titled “License on Empty” about a young kid who gets a drivers license and goes partying everywhere. He runs out of gas and ends up having to by for gas, maintainance as well as insruance – learning about responsibilty.

What’s this “3 x 10? thing? – See my post on focusing ideas:
http://www.leechon.com/focus-ideas-847.htm

Reading time: 2 – 4 minutes

A friend of mine passed me these videos a little while back. They’re a great refresher.

• First, Build a SOLID foundationHave a policy of working with only IDEAL clients. – Who are you and what do you offer to the world? Why do you do it? Its gotta be true. There are more people who stand for what you stand for. You want that.
• Second, Build TRUST and CREDIBILITY within the community.Make a connection. Have a conversation that revolves around, “Who do you serve? What their needs and desires are? What specific offerings you make them? What’s the return on investment that your average client gets?“
• Third, Self Promotion Strategy – (seven of them, apply only two) – what are they?

What lessons can you pull from this?

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3 x 10 :: Day 04

• Produce a “docu-lecture” – Every since I saw “Legend of the Furious Five” (extra DVD from Kung-Fu Panda) I got excited about producing a lecture DVD that’s designed to be on video. Imagine recording a Halaqa studio-cinematic style with short stories cutting in and out of the lecture visuals. Its almost like two paralel stories…sort of.

• Secure a partnership with a national or international client that specializes in educating people in the area of deen, language, self development or halaal financial mastery and launch an online learning system that is subscription based and membership focused.

• Produce a short film titled “Sunnah Smile” for the purposes of laying out a case study for Message Mastery students. A story about a little girl that gets bullied on her way to school. Bully always takes her lunch money. She tries to confront the big bully but ends up in the trash. She follows up with a new plan which leads to a flowery twist ending.

What’s this “3 x 10? thing? – See my post on focusing ideas:
http://www.leechon.com/focus-ideas-847.htm

Reading time: 2 – 3 minutes

The following I got from Seth Godin’s “The Big MOO!” – I Highly recommend everyone to read this book.

Joke #1

One day a patient came into a doctor’s office and complained about his arm. He said to the doctor, “It hurts when I do this.”

The doctor responded, “Don’t do that.”

da dum tishh!

Joke #2

A guy was walking to work one day and right outside his office he sees an penguin. He’s startled, doesn’t know what to do. So he takes the penguin into his boss’s office and asks his boss, “What should I do with this penguin?”

The book looks at him and says, “Take him to the zoo, you idiot!”

A few days later, out on the street, the boss runs into the guy and he still has the penguin. The boss is shocked. He looks at the guy and says, “I thouht I told you to take the penguin to the zoo!”

An the guy looks at his boss and says, “I did. But we had such a great time, today I’m taking him to a ball game.”

da dum tishh!

Joke #3

A woman from Ohio is walkin in midtown Manhattan. She’s a bit lost. She sees a man carrying a violin case, walks up to him, and asks him, “Excuse me, sir, how do you get to Carnegie Hall?”

The violinist looks at her and says, “Practice, practice, practice.”

da dum tishh!

What’s the secret?

• Stop doing things that hurt
• Do what you love
• Ignore what authority figures tell you
• Most of all…practice, practice, practice

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3 x 10 :: Day 03

1. Produce a low to mid-budget ($50,000 – $500,00) motion graphics based movie covering the story of the Israel-Palistine conflict starting from 1900 – Present time. Story would cover the Fall of the Ottoman Empire, the establishment of Middle Eastern states,  Involvement of British and French in turning Muslims against each other, Establishment of Israel to the Palestine-Israel conflict.
2. Produce a short video for online distribution based off of the letter of Umar ibn Abdil Azeez that was passed out in the Torch Bearer’s seminar.
3. Develop a Qabeelah training module within Message Mastery. Think AlMaghrib’s teacher training system by sensei on steriods.

What’s this “3 x 10? thing? – See my post on focusing ideas:
http://www.leechon.com/focus-ideas-847.htm