Ahoy, squirts! Quint here. This year marks the 20th Anniversary of Ain't It Cool News, which puts us somewhere in the vicinity of that Knight protecting the Holy Grail in internet years.
I've been personally involved with the site since its first year in one way or another. The landscape of online reporting has changed radically since the wild west days of the internet. I've seen friends and colleagues rise in prominence and drop out of the game completely.
One of the best things about working for this site is the freedom Harry allows his writers and editors. If one of us gets a wild hair up our ass to try out a new column then we try out that column. There's very little assigned in our editor's chat, so when you see one of us writing an editorial or talking in-depth about the day's news it's because we have something to say.
Over the years I've tried many different types of columns. Some have been successful, some have not. I burnt out on a few well-intentioned regular columns during my time here, I freely admit. I wish I had kept up with This Week In Star Wars a little better, but I'm proud of the content I pumped out while I was on the ball.
Since we're celebrating our 20th birthday this year I decided I wanted to resurrect some of my more popular columns. I'm going to start with one of my favorites: the Behind the Scenes Picture of the Day column, where I seek out and publish a BTS pic every day of the week and open up a discussion about the movie in question.
It also happens to be 6 years to the day from when I posted the very first BTSPotD column, so the timing felt right.
One of the main reasons I quit the BTS column after 2-3 years of continual publishing was I felt like I hit a wall. I'd published hundreds and hundred of great BTS images from all kinds of movies and to be honest it felt like I ran out of the good stuff.
My fascination with how movies come together didn't wane, though, and in the years since the first run of BTS column ended I've still been gathering BTS pics and feel like I've refilled the coffers enough to start it going again.
I can't promise this run will last another couple of years, but I will promise that I'll give you guys a heads up when the column is winding down again instead of it just suddenly not appearing anymore. Based on what I have right this very second I'd say we're good for three months or more.
So, let's kick this thing off, shall we?
Most of these columns will be a single image, but since this is a special occasion I'm going to post three rare BTS images from the making of Jaws. These images come from a crew member who sold his personal photographs at auction a few years ago.
These all come from the finale, when the shark finally makes a meal out of poor ol' Quint. The first image is the least flashy, but my favorite of the bunch because you can make out Spielberg through the window of the Orca (white tee shirt) while his crew is busy behind him setting up the shot, which is likely the moments immediately after Bruce jumps up and starts sinking the Orca, his jaws snapping on any and everything that slides down towards his mouth.
The second and third images feature the shark at work. Enjoy!
So, hope you're glad to see this column come back. If you have any cool or rare BTS shots you want to share, feel free to click on my email below and get in touch.
Some good stuff coming up, squirts. Stay tuned!
-Eric Vespe
”Quint”
quint@aintitcool.com
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