Don Cardona

By Georgia Akers

Outside the Arena with... Don Cardona

Without visual media, our world would be dull. No television shows, no news, no movies and no sports that we can watch from the comfort of our home. I had an opportunity to interview one of those men behind the camera who not only does the camera work but also the editing and producing.

His name is Don Cardona. He recently did a short film on a PRCA bull rider that has been selected at the Wild Bunch Film Festival where it is up for multiple awards.

We are fortunate to have those video professionals that bring so much to our world.

Tell us about yourself.

I was born and raised in Grand Junction, Colorado and spent most of my youth playing baseball competitively through high school. I met my wife Erin in Los Angeles while working together at TVG Network. We have two kids, my son Alex is entering his senior year of high school and my daughter Samantha is a sophomore.

I went to Central High School in Grand Junction and then studied at Arizona State University in the Walter Cronkite School of Journalism & Telecommunication. I got into sports television as a student, working as a camera operator on live network sports broadcasts and then later moved up to director with TVG Network. I spent 10 years as a live event producer with ESPN and then as Senior Coordinating Producer with Universal Sports Network/NBC Sports covering Olympic and Endurance sports. I’ve been blessed to have produced MLB All Star & World Series games, professional baseball in the Caribbean, Super Bowls, Olympics for NBC and multiple Boston Marathons.

I directed a short western film in high school that me and my classmates had fun with and I directed two short films shortly after college. A couple of years ago I directed a 3-minute short about bull riding school called “Punishment” that won Best Documentary in the 2018 My Røde Reel’s International Short Film Competition.

You have a film that has been recently selected by the Wild Bunch Film Festival as one of their films. Tell us about Wild Bunch Film Festival and your film?

The 6th Annual Wild Bunch Film Festival is a western-genre festival that runs September 30-October 3 and coincides with the 71st Rex Allen Rodeo Days. TWBFF was tops on my festival submission list mainly because of the natural fit, but because it also has a lot of fun activities that go along with the festival, such as a parade, car show and gun show and there appears to be some really good short, narrative and documentary films this year.

My film, “Buckin’ Bulls: The Story of Ty Rinaldo” will make its World Premiere. It shows how events are produced, the logistics that go into it and shows how young bull riders can improve their skills. And it also gives some perspective from PBR rider Chase Outlaw and World Champs Cody Custer and Lyle Sankey.

The film was nominated for seven awards, including Best Documentary, Best Director (Documentary), Best Cinematography (Documentary), Best Rodeo Documentary, Best Produced Documentary, Best Colorado Film and Best of the Fest Film.

How did this film come about?

When I was a young camera operator in Phoenix, I was the cameraman on the chutes for ESPN’s coverage of the Coors Rodeo Showdown. I didn’t realize how much energy there was between the rider and the bull and I just thought anyone who got on a bull was crazy. It gave me a different appreciation for bull riding and I would watch it on tv through the years. When I moved back to Colorado, I attended the Castle Rock Bull Riding event with a couple of neighbors and one neighbor told me the bulls buck because a rope was tied around a bull’s privates. I didn’t believe that so I had to find out more. At the end of the night I re-introduced myself to stock contractor Ty Rinaldo who was producing the event. Ty and I both went to the same high school but we were only acquaintances. He invited me down to his ranch the following week to see what he did and also to talk about the bull business and how it works.

Talking with Ty at his TZ Ranch, I asked a lot of questions about how the bulls are cared for, the training, what he feeds them and of course how he made the bulls buck and I was skeptical when he told me that there was nothing he could do to make them buck. I asked about the rope and he told me the flank strap was used to tickle the them and the bulls are trying to kick the strap off. I asked if I could document what he does for people like me who didn’t know much about the sport. And my idea of documenting at the time was creating 3-5 minute video clips for YouTube or social media.

Why did you select a bull rider? And why Ty Rinaldo?

When I started this project in 2018, I never thought about doing a story on a bull rider, just the bulls. But as I was talking with Ty I remembered that he was a Colorado State Champion Bull Rider in high school (actually a 2-time state champion) and the more I talked to him and others about his career, I found out that he was very highly regarded as a bull rider. He not only won high school titles but collegiate championships and won the 1992 CPRA championship as well and was ranked as high as 12th in the PRCA. He was coached by Lyle Sankey and was Cody Custer’s travel partner when he turned pro. After following him around at various events that year and the more I learned, Ty as a bull rider became an important part of the story. About a month into shooting I also discovered how successful he’s been as a stock contractor, having taken a number of bulls to the PBR World Finals and the National Finals Rodeo which are no small feats.

What preparation did you undergo prior to filming?

There wasn’t really much preparation prior to shooting. As I previously mentioned this was just going to be a social media type of project. But the preparation I did was mainly asking questions of Ty and others to see if there was anything interesting about bull riding I didn’t know, and gathering up the equipment I would need to shoot it, such as a camera, microphones, lighting, etc. Most of the preparation happened somewhat on-the-fly and I wasn’t really prepared for all of the travel stock contractors do so I wasn’t able to make every event.

Did you have a general script or did it just develop as you filmed?

The documentary “script” was developed as I filmed because I didn’t quite understand what I was getting myself into, and because I was a one-man-band. I was still working full-time so after I shot some event footage or interviews I put it on my computer and would make short clips when I could. When Covid hit, I devoted most of my time into working the story and it developed into a feature length film.

What was the most difficult part of making the film?

There were a couple of difficult parts. First was trying to attend all of the events that Ty was working. The other was shooting video and capturing the audio. I had been a producer for so long that it took me a while to re-learn how to get my camera settings right and to get good audio. I also was teaching myself how to use my editing program so it was a lot longer of a process than it probably needed to be. Related to that was making sure I had all of my legal clearances for participant appearances, music and news footage.

Did you ever think about riding a bull while you were filming?

Multiple times, but I knew I’d be better at documenting it rather than participating in it, and my wife would not have been happy. I did take some risks that nearly got me killed though. The final event I covered, I decided to get close up and shoot from inside the arena. It was the first bull of the day, the bull bucked off the rider and went in the opposite direction. As the bull approached the out-gate he decided to hit the brakes and headed in my direction. I got up the gate as high as I could but it wasn’t enough, he “hooked” me in the hip and flung me up and over the gate as I held onto the camera. My life flashed before my eyes and it gave me first hand experience on how hard they hit you. I was in a lot of pain and had a hard time walking the rest of the day.

Is there anything special that you learned from making this film?

Aside from me learning what I was capable of in terms of storytelling and using the equipment, the most important part of making this film was learning how tight-knit the bull riding community is and how much passion they have for the bulls. There is a great sense of family. So many people I met while shooting this project have become really great friends and will go the extra mile to help out if needed. I feel like I’ve been welcomed into the family and I have a better understanding of the sport and how the bulls are treated like royalty. That’s special and I feel as if I’ve become an accidental ambassador.

You have a lot of experience in the sports industry. What two sports do you enjoy producing the most and why?

Baseball was my first love, so that is number one. It’s one of the few sports where you perform as an individual and with a team, and covering baseball allows more time for storytelling. And I’ve been a part of some really great baseball events in my career. If we’re not including bull riding, the other is Olympics which is more of a sport category. Producing Olympic sports truly is “the thrill of victory and the agony of defeat,” and there is a lot of storytelling to help viewers know who these athletes are. So I guess that means I enjoy sports where there is opportunity to tell stories.

You are not dealing with actors but real people with stories you want to tell. What is the easiest thing about this?

The easiest, and most rewarding thing about telling stories about real people is having a natural curiosity to find out what’s below the surface so that the viewer can connect with the subject, what we call in the broadcasting industry as “humanizing” them, which basically means finding something about them we can relate to. It could be showing what they do, capturing what they say, relating similar experiences or hearing what other people say about them.

What is the hardest?

The flip side is it’s not always easy to get people to respond to a filmmaker or reporter they don’t know that well or are unsure how the filmmaker will portray them. Sometimes the person you’re interviewing may be guarded or shy or may not want to answer a question and trying to get them to answer without having those reservations is the hardest part.

What do you hope people will take away from the documentary?

I hope people who live the western lifestyle appreciate the film from a different perspective, the ground level — perhaps differently than what they may see produced on tv or on social media. I also hope that people who aren’t familiar with bull riding get to share my experience — that these bulls are loved and cared for, they’re athletes and they are really good at what they do. And finally, I hope that people can relate to Ty’s journey, the struggles and success, and better understand the western way of life.

Ty Rinaldo (left) and Don Cardona (right).

Do you have any other western sports projects in the future?

I am in the early stages of development for some future projects. I’ve met so many great people since this film’s inception and found out about their backgrounds or contributions to the sport and there are so many great stories. There hasn’t been a ton of media coverage like some of the other sports until recently so the challenge is to try and tell older stories using minimal footage or pictures. The media that covers sports now has done a great job at making it accessible.

What type of equipment is necessary to be a film maker?

It depends on the type of film and, of course, the budget. For “Buckin’ Bulls” I knew it was going to be a lot of “run-and-gun.” I needed equipment that was small enough so it wouldn’t be a distraction as well as light enough that I could climb over the fences and gates and not worry about expensive damage from the bulls, gates or dirt so I used a 4K mirrorless camera with an assortment of camera lenses; an audio recorder with a shotgun mic; and a pair of wireless lavaliere mics for interviews; For editing I used Final Cut Pro X editing software. For larger projects with bigger budgets it may require multiple cameras, microphones and lighting. And if a filmmaker can hire a dedicated crew for each of those positions it would help out tremendously.

Where and when can people watch the “Buckin’ Bulls” documentary?

Right now “Buckin’ Bulls” is in the film festival submission process so notifications come as I receive them. If anyone is in the southern Arizona region they can attend The Wild Bunch Film Festival where it will make its World Premiere on Saturday, October 2. Check out their website for show times, https://www.thewildbunchfilmfestival. com/. If people want to stay updated on the film’s theatrical or streaming release they can visit buckin-bulls.com, facebook.com/ BuckinBulls or buckin_bulls_brand on Instagram.