Thursday, July 8th, 2010
After six months in the making, my dear friend and collaborator Wade Hampton has finished his short film/music video “GOODING: No One Gets Out Alive,” and all of us involved couldn’t be more ecstatic.
I’m just happy to see Wade complete a new film (he’s been wanting to work on a new one, and our friend Gooding had wanted him to do a music video, but nothing really gelled until now). It was a pleasure being on Wade’s set, and the photography by Wade and rock star Lonny Quattlebaum is superb. I’m very happy to be involved with the project.
It’s honestly also the only time you will probably ever see me in a cowboy hat. But, you never know…
Please check out the film, link it on to others and enjoy. It’s 15 minutes of wonderful weirdness, so be prepared. “Experimental” would only begin to describe this work. I’m terrible at this kind of filmmaking. Wade soars. (The film will also be shown before our special Halloween screening of “The Dead Can’t Dance” on Oct. 29 at the Orpheum Theatre.)
Cowboy mosyin’ on,
-r.
Watch “GOODING: No One Gets Out Alive”
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Thursday, May 20th, 2010
Found out our screening in Montreal will be on Saturday, June 19, at 7 p.m. That’s a fantastic slot! They must have really liked the flick.
I have to have it transferred to DigiBeta format for the festival, and that will be our exhibition print. The great, knowledgeable people at Outpost Worldwide is handling the transfer, which is not cheap. The whole process is going to cost about $300. Yeesh.
We’re waiting to hear on a few more festivals, and we’ve got other submissions coming up, too. We’re ready to go worldwide! Hopefully the world wants us.
Onward,
-r.
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Sunday, March 28th, 2010
HOLY ZOMBIE BLOOD!! Less than two weeks until the premiere of “The Dead Can’t Dance.”
We’re finalizing preparations, which is no easy feat, but it’s exciting. The after party is going to be cool. We’ll show a blooper reel and make it a fun evening.
And we hit the streets this weekend during the FInal Friday gallery crawl, handing out flyers like crazy, talking it up. And lots of people seem very excited.
I am getting some questions about the movie, so let me address some:
– It’s not very gory, as zombies movies go. No one is seen eating a spleen or anything like that.
– It’s more a comedy and satire than a scary movie, though it is intense in places.
– It’s a character-driven story. It’s really about the four main characters trying to get through the night, against the bigger backdrop of all this strange stuff happening around them. They have to put their differences aside and have to work together to survive. I say it’s more of a “movie with zombies” than a “zombie movie.”
– It would probably be rated PG-13 or maybe a mild R because of some profanity, which is actually used for comedic effect. There’s no nudity, although we do have zombie strippers, er, I mean zombie exotic dancers. The violence is mild at best.
– Tickets are only available at the door. With all our promotion and everyone involved, I think we’re going to have a pretty big crowd, so people might want to get there early.
And that’s about it for now. The sound designer is sending me the final audio mix this week, and we should have a final print by next weekend. I simply can’t believe it.
The countdown is on!
-r.
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Saturday, March 20th, 2010
Wow, what a bizarre week this was. Without going too much into it, I was the target of some slandering this week, which was inaccurate and mean-spirited. It just made me stronger, made me realize again how much support we have, and how the people who truly know me know how hard I’ve worked for so long, and know that I would never deliberately hurt anyone.
I’m all too happy to lend support to others as much as I can, which many people will confirm, but there’s no law saying that I HAVE to. I do it because I know hard filmmaking is and how much courage it takes, not only to put yourself on the line for scrutiny and criticism, but for the fact that people think they know you when they haven’t the slightest idea, just because you’re in the public eye. I know my ethics. I stand by them, and always will.
On the good side, things are still rolling toward our premiere of “The Dead Can’t Dance” April 10 at the Orpheum Theatre. Talked with sound designer Sergio by e-mail today and he is finishing up editing and working on the mixdown of the audio, the artistry that he is so good at. Also, got one final bit of ADR work from James with some particularly important (but barely audible) lines. It’s perfect!
Craig was hard at work this week plastering posters all over the city, and we seem to be generating some nice buzz. It’s going to be a great event, no matter what.
‘Cause I won’t stand down from anything, I’ve come too far and worked too hard. And I’m very proud of our film. I can’t wait to share it.
All the best — always,
-r.
Posted in Inspiration, The Dead Can't Dance, postproduction | 1 Comment »
Monday, March 8th, 2010
It’s a huge understatement, of course, but there’s so many steps in making a movie, and it all takes so incredible long.
Almost two years into “The Dead Can’t Dance” (which is nothing in filmmaking time), I’m beyond thrilled to be in the latter stages of post-production. But I’m still laboring over some color-correction issues. I’m using Red Giant Software to give the film a dated film look using its aptly named Looks filters software.
It is an indie digital filmmaker’s dream. You apply the software to the clip on your Final Cut Pro timeline, and a palette of different “looks” pops up. Depending on the visual feel you want for your film, you click on a “look” and it applies all the settings for you (manipulating color curves, saturation, effects, etc). Pretty amazing.
Beyond that (or in lieu of it if you don’t want to change your raw video image that much), the Looks program comes with tools for color correction, letting you alter the exposure, contrast, saturation, or add a color gradient (to make a sky bluer, for instance) or do 3-point color correction and more. It really is a phenomenal tool, and will probably only be improved in updates. I highly recommend it.
While this process is (somewhat) fun in its own right, color correction is also a laborious, time-consuming process. As I mentioned in earlier posts, I already added film “scratches” and “dust” to give the movie a pulpy, B-movie feel — enough to give it texture but not be distracting.
I’m also going for a color-reversal film-stock look for the exterior scenes. It gives the beginning of the film a very dreamy, surreal look, and when the action moves to indoors and nighttime, I let the lighting that Jerod designed set the visual mood.
But, really, it’s all going well, which is fantastic ’cause this Saturday we’ll be ONE MONTH AWAY from our screening. Awesome!
There should be posters all over town now, and we’re getting a second batch made this week so we can hang more. A lot of people are asking if they can buy tickets in advance, which is cool that they’re asking, but it’s not possible. Only at the door.
Here’s to living — or dead — color,
-r.
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Wednesday, March 3rd, 2010
Holy cow! It’s March! That means our world premiere screening is only 5 weeks away from this Saturday. Wow…
We’re busily preparing. We had a promo meeting this week and came up with some cool and unusual ideas for promotion. We’re setting those in motion now, and will involve street-theatre-type stuff, a “zombie walk,” fake news coverage, Spookt Soda (featured in the movie) campaigns and more. We’re making it a HUGE event. It’s gonna be a blast!
Post work on the actual film continues. I’m STILL messing with Looks filters, and Sergio is making headway on audio editing and mixing. He’s in Albuquerque this week, so he’ll get some ADR work with Guy done while he’s there. Perfect!
I will be featured in an article in Kansas magazine next month, and will be traveling to Lawrence for a photo shoot on March 20, so while I’m there, I’ll check in with Sergio, take a look at stuff and do some of my own ADR work. Everything is working out!
Marching on,
-r.
Posted in The Dead Can't Dance, postproduction, zombies | 1 Comment »
