[Click Here to see enlarged view of 1954 Stockton Record News Article.] 

As I mark my first year anniversary as Professor of Digital Filmmaking at the School  of Art, Design and Media at Nanyang Technological University in Singapore, 2014 was a year of several movie-making anniversaries for me.

1989 – 25 years since starting my EXPLODING THE FRAME research on developing a new cinematic language for giant immersive screens.

1979 – 35 years since receiving an Academy Award with Jacqueline Phillips Shedd for Best Documentary Short Subject for THE FLIGHT OF THE GOSSAMER CONDOR and beginning teaching at USC’s School of Cinematic Arts. http://www.gossamercondor.com

1974 – 40 years since Associate Producing the very first PBS NOVA science program WHERE DID THE COLORADO GO? and the NOVA series going on the air on PBS.

1964 – 50 years since high school graduation

1954 – 60 years since I started making movies

I am attaching my first movie press clipping for my first acting role in 1954 as Prince Valiant in KNIGHTS OF THE SQUARE TABLE movie, the first of seven fully costumed narrative films my father made each year with the neighbor kids where I played roles like Mountain Man Tom Fitzpatrick, Sheriff Wyatt Earp, and World War I fighter pilot Baron Von Richthofen.  These films are now in the Academy of Motion Picture Arts & Sciences Film Archive.

Also on the list are graduating with an MA Degree in Cinema from USC’s School of Cinematic Arts and a BA Degree in Radio/Television/Film from San Francisco State University’s Department of Cinema and directing & producing 3 giant screen OMNIMAX films plus teaching cinema production and business at 7 universities, but they don’t have as good 5 and 10 year anniversary dates as the list above.  http://benshedd.com/about/

60 years in the movies and counting…