I finally watched the DVD of Outside The Wire from beginning to end.

It is strange to watch.It was harder to log the tapes and edit it.  Imagine, a first person filming of 5 months of your life then having to watch it.

The tape where I rode past an IED or stacked up with the guys as they hit a target house creates a peculiar emotional response.  When I was filming everything in Iraq, I was numb, almost emotionless, so 'in the moment' that I was oblivious to the dangers around me.Watching those scenes on tape, I experienced the emotions I should have felt while on the mission.

The result of being able to watch and hear everything again has given me three sets of memories--unfilmed, watched and highly edited.I have watched the scenes in the movie so many times they have become a prism through which all my Iraq memories are refracted.

Slowly the unfilmed memories grow fuzzy.  The ones I have merely watched are clear.  The ones I edited are discomforting to watch and are in my thoughts in vivid 60i.

The other commissioned projects I have taken on do not cause this.  In those I am merely a tradesman putting together a project, after the newsworthy events happened.  But Outside The Wire was my life and the lives of some of America's finest. 

Being in Al Anbar with those guys was an experience I would never trade. 

Making a movie like this is something I hope to never endure again.

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