Pittsburgh Strip District Scene

While I love filmmaking, it unfortunately doesn't pay the bills...yet. In the mean time I do freelance graphic design. I'm currently working on the interior design of a new restaurant franchise here in Pittsburgh. The theme of the restaurant is an outdoor city cafe utilizing Pittsburgh landmarks and locations. I've attached a piece of artwork here for your viewing pleasure. This is a rough-mock up of one of the walls. I'll post the finished piece once it's completed.

A Real American Hero

From now on when I hear the word "America" I will think of this clip. If only the movie could capture a fraction of this.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DN034sBeF4c

Ed Piskor

Just discovered Ed Piskor's blog at http://edpiskor.blogspot.com/.

Ed is not only a nationally recognized Pittsburgh comic book artist, having illustrated some of Harvey Pekar's books (the guy Paul Giamatti was playing in American Splendor for those unfamiliar with non DC/Marvel comic books), but he is also a fellow Munhall native and a graduate of Steel Valley High School.

In high school you could always pick our outwork out of the all the stuff hanging on the walls, since we were the ones drawing comics and super-heroes while everyone else was doing portraits of Tupac and Biggie.

I encourage you to peruse his selection of art on the blog or on his website.

100 Movies 100 Numbers

Blasto Poster Pt. 2

On this next pass you can see there's some more detail, primarily light and shadows. (Click to see the larger image.)You'll notice the chest emblem is still just a red circle. I've been working on redesigning the Blasto logo and haven't come up with it yet. While I like the original bomb logo, it doesn't quite work as a chest emblem in the way the Superman "S", Bat symbol, or Flash lighting bolt does. Need something a bit cleaner and more stylized.

Blasto Poster Pt. 1

I'm making a Captain Blasto poster for my brother for Christmas and thought this would be a great opportunity to show you guys the process of making the artwork for the film. Below you see the first step. While most people assume all the artwork is 100% digital, it all starts with a simple pencil drawing. This will eventually be the crimson comet himself soaring through space.After I've scanned in the pencil drawing, I begin to trace over it with colored shapes using the vector draw tool. It starts out very flat with very little depth or detail.

A Star and a Tree

Saw this on Kleiber's blog and had to post it over here. Without a doubt, the single greatest Christmas commercial ever made. It says so much with so little. No matter where you are, at home, a noisy bar, a busy restaurant, when this commercial comes on everybody turns their attention towards it. For you out of towners who have never seen this, you're in for a treat.

Mercury Men Stills Pt. 2

And your first look at one of the Mercury Men themselves...

Mercury Men Stills

Here's a few stills from the upcoming short:

The film should be completed by the end of the month. The effects and contrast correction are coming along very nicely, but take a VERY LONG time, especially when you're not working on a very fast computer. After another wave of corrupted projects and random crashes, I vow that if it's within my power I will never edit another film on a PC again.

I'll have more stills (and possibly some rough footage) soon.

The Art of G.I. Joe

This may be one of the top five websites ever found:
The Art of G.I. Joe: 1982 - 1985

The Greatest Decade: Part II

If this commercial does NOT make you happy then you are a cold, heartless robot.

This next video gives a great look at what the place looked/felt like years ago. Unfortunately I couldn't find a single clip of the clapping animal hands.

And finally, a look behind-the-scenes.

What's sad is that the gym that took over the Chuck E. Cheese building in West Mifflin STILL has the little door.

Never Wait

I'm a long time reader of a website containing dozens of great articles on screenwriting by Terry Rosio and and Ted Elliot (Aladdin, Pirates of the Caribbean trilogy). These guys GET what makes a great story.

I recently came across an article on the site that knocked me on my ass. Somebody working in a craft as uncertain and fickle as film production constantly needs fuel tossed into the fire. For all the rejection, criticism, failure, and self-doubt, you sometimes need a message that gets you through the next leg of the race. This article was that to me. It's VERY long, but well worth the read, and applicable to all.

"Never Wait" by Terry Rossio

Opportunity meets Readiness

I landed on Jenna (Pam Beasley) Fischer's mySpace blog today and found a great post with advice for those of us pursuing careers in the entertainment industry:

I have a great acting coach who says that success in Hollywood is based on one thing: Opportunity meets Readiness. You cannot always control the opportunities, but you can control the readiness. So, study your craft, take it seriously. Do every play, every showcase, every short film, every student film you can get. Swallow your pride. Be willing to work for nothing in things you think are stupid. Make work for yourself. Make your own luck. Don't complain. Hopefully, the work will find you if you are ready.

You can read the rest of her entry here.

Shots from the Mercury Shoot

Here's some behind-the-scenes shots taken by Kati, Lindsey, and Evan during yesterdays FIFTEEN HOUR shoot. (No, that's not a typo. Fifteen hours.) If you've seen Captain Blasto, you notice some pretty big similarity in Mark Tierno's character.

League Concept Art

Here's another shot of concept art for the upcoming short:
This is a member of the league, responsible for protecting "the battery," which you'll see in later posts.

Star Wars Maps

I have a confession to make. I have a REALLY REALLY dorky hobby. I'm almost embarrassed to admit it, but I make Star Wars maps for board games. Before you judge me, remember, you've got some dorky hobby too. I'm sure you've got Beanie Babies tucked away some where, or a miniature railroad in your basement.

Why Star Wars maps? Well, I stay up really late. Ashley and Sawyer usually head up around 10:30 - 11:00, but I usually don't hit the sack until about 2:00 - 3:00. Typically I'll fill that time with writing (screenplays, film shorts) or editing. But every few months, when I don't have a current project in the works, I find myself translating famous Star Wars locales into overhead maps for various games. It began with Hoth several years ago, just to see if I could it it, and for some reason I just kept on going. Jabba's Palace, the Death Star, all the way through to the Ewok Village.

Now in my defense I have benefited somewhat from this hobby. 1) I've learned an incredible amount more about Photoshop, which has helped me on other projects. 2) The maps have been noticed by the lead designer of the Star Wars game and he has offered to potentially use them in later releases. 3) I've uploaded the various maps onto different sites and they've been downloaded by thousands of Star Wars game fans and are used in homes, game shops, and conventions around the world. (You wouldn't believe how many downloads I've had from Brazil alone.) They have even been featured in an online version of the game. Every once in a while I check in with CafePress.com, an online printing company that offers these maps via print-on-demand, and they have made several thousand dollars off of them. (Unfortunately none of that profit is extended to the artist due to copyright.)

Recently I created a website where all the maps can be seen, downloaded, and(or) printed and I thought you normal people might enjoy seeing them, and get a glimpse into my dorky nightlife.
http://starwarsmaps.blogspot.com

Invader Concept Art

Here's another piece of rough concept art I did for the upcoming short depicting "the invaders."

Leah's Engaged!

Yep, she's gettin' hitched and headin' off to America's headquarters for cars and crime, Detroit. In mere months her new name will be Leah Leach. Very comic book sounding. She fits right in with Lois Lane, Lana Lang, and Lex Luthor.

You may recognize her as "girl laughing in the backyard as Colin looks over the fence" in Captain Blasto. Not only is Leah a great friend to both Ashley and I, she's been a constant ear for stories and a script reader all the way from Blasto through Zero Day. She even helped color some storyboards on Blasto.

Congratulations Leah, and remember to keep a picture of him around at all times. You never know when you might wake up with amnesia.

You can read all about the engagement and more on Leah's blog at: http://leewards.blogspot.com.

The Mercury Men

Got another short film I'm lining up and thought y'all might enjoy a peek at some concept art I did for it.On a side note, Google Analytics tells me there's a couple hundred of you reading this each week, from varying countries. That's pretty freakin' crazy. I honestly thought I was just writing for the heck of it. Now that gives me some incentive to write a bit more often. And now that you've all been outed by the good folks at Google, you don't need to continue to lurk in the shadows. You can actually comment on stuff.

G.I. Joe: A Real Politically Correct Hero

According to Fox News, the upcoming G.I. Joe movie, under the direction of Stephen Sommers (Van Helsing, The Scorpion King), will be making a rather large shift in the origin story.

"Paramount has confirmed that in the movie, the name G.I. Joe will become an acronym for "Global Integrated Joint Operating Entity" — an international, coed task force charged with defeating bad guys. It will no longer stand for government issued, as in issued by the American government."

Why would they do this I wonder?

"The word is that in the current political climate, they're afraid that a heroic U.S. soldier won't fly."

Then why are you making a movie about heroic U.S. soldiers? If you want a politically correct "global integrated joint operating entity" you should be making Captain Planet. Heaven forbid we offend other countries by telling stories about heroic Americans. Especially fictional ones named Beach Head, Shipwreck, and Lady Jaye fighting villains with metal heads and serpent costumes.

Something similar to this happened with Superman Returns. If you remember, Superman's response to "why are you here" in the original 1978 film was to fight for "truth, justice, and the American way." In Superman Returns they changed his personal motto to "truth, justice, and all that stuff" because they were afraid that America's current international image would reflect negatively on Superman with foreign audiences.

Why must we take fictional American heroes and disassociate them until there's very little American about them? More than any other pop culture characters, Superman and G.I. Joe were created to celebrate our countries core beliefs, not to be ashamed of our current political "climate." In fact I think the climate could use a bit more heroic American imagery, and not just the fictional sort.

Oakland Film Festival Wrap-up

Attended the first North Way Oakland Film Festival last night. I was pretty impressed with many of the films. Of the ones that I can remember, Robin Rd., a black and white film noir, had nice framing and lighting. Wanted, which won best short film, was a neat concept. (It also featured Shawn Smith, who I previously worked with on the Assassin's Creed video.) Erie, which may be my personal favorite of the night and won best documentary, featured two friends riding their bikes 130 miles to Lake Erie in the middle of a 19 degree winter weekend. Although the filming wasn't particularly spectacular you'd be hard pressed to find a cinematographer that could achieve much better in a gray Pittsburgh winter. The story and it's stars were funny and endearing.

The night also included a handful of self-portrait pieces that featured 45 second stories by each director who were not able to maintain a shot longer than a few frames. They were frantic, sometimes funny, and captured a wide range of hobbies, experiences, or beliefs.

One of my fears of a church holding a film festival is that they are going to limit what's being shown to clean, G rated, 7th Heaven style stories. North Way however, showed films with a whole range of subjects that you'd be surprised to find in a church. There was a documentary on a father hoping to win custody of his child and a short film featuring a guy who has been sleeping with a girl for months and is terrified to discover she loves him.

The general tone ranged from serious to very serious, so my only critique is that a bit more lighthearted selections would have been appreciated. Nintendo Office ending up taking home a prize in the Misc. category. That makes the quickest video I've ever made now the most successful, which is hysterical.

Great job done by Lindsey, Mike, and the gang down at North Way Oakland.

HBO Intro: Behind the Scenes

A little while back I posted a video clip of the infamous HBO Feature Presentation introduction. (You know the amazing one that flies past the miniature houses into space.) You can see it here if you missed it. While searching for that video, I discovered this behind-the-scenes video on how they created it. It's amazing to see just how much talent, time, and money went into something like that. (And I still say that the music cue is better than 90% of today's soundtracks.) Enjoy.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3Et_LsxlX8Y

Fables

A year and a half ago I did a series of short animated "fables" for my church. I use the word animation lightly because there's not much movement. They're more a combination of character art, music, and sometimes text.

Beyond the obvious influences (Samurai Jack, The Legend of Zelda), the idea of doing this style of picture stories ultimately comes from older video games. Before they were able to do full 3D characters, environments, and audible dialogue, video games were limited to showing still images with music and captions. Even with these limitations they were able to tell some great stories.

Below is one of them, the fourth in a series of five. And the rest can be found at: http://www.youtube.com/CPreksta. I will leave each of their meanings to your own interpretation.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_X-_9wvbDTg

Assassin's Creed Video Online

Our entry into the IFC/Ubisoft Assassin's Creed short film contest is now on YouTube.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=b5L3Fb-sE3Y

Unfortunately we didn't make the final 10. Regretfully (and unknown to me), the contest was open to ANY video that featured murder/assassination, regardless of when it was created. Therefore, while they may be impressive, 7 out of the final 10 are videos that were not created for this contest, have been finished for months, many with budgets even greater than the prize money offered, and have little or no connection to the game on which this contest was based.

Regardless of the results, it was great experience. Thanks to all involved.

Proof the 80's Was The Greatest Decade

My wife hates the 80's. She hates the fashion, the music, and the movies. Now I can't speak too much for the fashion. Slap bracelets, Swatch watches, and "jams" aside, 80's fashion is pretty bad. As for music, she likes country, so convincing her to listen to "Maneater" is hopeless. But the movies of the 80's? There is no debate. It is without a doubt, the greatest decade in film history.

After viewing such masterpieces as Raiders of the Lost Ark, E.T., The Empire Strikes Back, and Back to the Future, she's begun to come around. And we haven't even gotten to the second stringers like The Karate Kid.

You see, if the 80's did anything well it was that they made everything bigger than it actually was. That's not just a truck, why that's Optimus Prime, leader of the Autobots. That's no run of the mill prince, that's He-Man, Master of the Universe. The 80's were all about taking something normal and transforming it into something big and exciting.

And in that spirit I present a video that should lay all doubts of 80's greatness to rest. A video that puts into images what words cannot express. Why it's no mere introduction, it is an experience all unto itself. One in which whole movies of today fall short. Enjoy.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SdI90Rtzu1s

Problems at IFC.com

Well, today was the day we were to find out about the Assassin's Creed contest. I checked the site (IFC.com) this morning and discovered that instead of IFC posting ONLY the top ten finalists, they posted EVERY ENTRY. This includes a lot of videos that violate a lot of rules/guidelines, and many other videos where somebody just took the official trailer to the game and replaced the soundtrack with a popular band (Nickelback oddly enough.) There's even a video where they include footage from a completely different game.

Clearly somebody messed up. This is reinforced by the fact that all of the entries mysteriously disappeared a few short hours later and have yet to return.

I was a little bit disappointed to see that the majority of the entries were videos that have been on IFC's website for months (if not longer) and weren't created for the contest/game. They were just entered for the heck of it. Some of them are videos with budgets even larger then the prize money.

But the biggest disappointment of all is IFC's video player. Not only is it really slow, choppy, and pixelated, but it downgrades the quality of the original video GREATLY. There were a lot of videos shot on very good cameras (including our own) that don't look nearly as good. I even noticed several videos where the audio/video is out of sync. I highly doubt that's how the video was submitted.

Why create website for films if you're going to showcase them in poor quality?

Oakland Film Festival

Just wanted to let y'all know about a short film festival that's happening in Oakland next week. (That's Oakland in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania for you out of town readers.) It's all going down Friday, September 7th from 8:00 - 10:00 PM at North Way Oakland, 120 McKee Place, Pittsburgh, PA 15213. Cost is $3.00. All the films will be screening on a large widescreen HD projection screen.

The first year festival will feature short films from local filmmakers, primarily Art Institute students. I've got three films screening, including The Nintendo Office and a short animated piece from a year or so ago. I encourage y'all to come check this first year festival.

Assassin Pictures

Here's some photos from the production:

Storyboards

Prop swords

The assassin costume made by Ricky Lyle

Part of the cast (L to R): Shawn Smith, Bobby Zinsmeister, Sam Nicotero, Chris Young, Curt Wootton. Not Pictured: Mark Tierno, Devin Reilly.

Film Still: The assassin surrounded.

Film Still: The dead Viscount.

Assassin's Creed Contest

Finally finished and submitted our entry into the IFC/Ubisoft Assassin's Creed video contest. The contest was to create a six minute film inspired by the upcoming game, Assassin's Creed, which follows a 12th century middle-eastern assassin.

All I can say is that it was a pretty intense two weeks and I'm pleased with the final product. It was a nice challenge to try something in a period genre I don't have much experience in. It was also nice to work with Curt, Mark, and Sam again.

Unfortunately I can't post the video because it could potentially disqualify us. I can post pictures, so expect them soon. As soon as voting opens I'll let y'all know. We'd appreciate you taking a few minutes to vote for our entry once the video goes live.

Heinz Commercial

Last week I saw an ad for a contest on the back of a Heinz Ketchup bottle. Make a 30 second commercial and win $57,000. I had some free time while visiting family in Florida. One hour of filming, two hours of video editing, another hour of music editing, and here she is, my entry in the contest. Enjoy.

New York

The Nintendo Office played up here...

In this room...
On one of these HD flat screen TV's...

But our video wasn't in HD, or any of the other shorts for that matter, so it just looked normal.

The observatory is called Top of the Rock. It costs $20 (yes, we had to pay to see our own movie) and is based around a tour of the construction of Rockefeller along with NBC's long residence there. So in between gazing out at New York and listening to fun facts from Tom Brokaw people would walk past some short films. It's basically filmmaking's equivalent of a guy playing a saxophone in the subway. He may be good and you may like, but you aint stoppin' to listen. Especially when all of Central Park is sprawled out before you.

All in all a good trip. Caught Lovedrug/Sparta show with Eric, Em, and Bradstreet. Lovedrug is RIDICULOUSLY good. I suggest you give the guys a listen.

Trib Article

Here's the link to the article about The Nintendo Office which ran yesterday in the Pittsburgh Tribune-Review's evening edition, Trib P.M. (That title sounds kind of naughty.)

"Making a Game of It"

And here's an interview with Jack Paccione, director of the winning entry "Good vs. Wiivil."'

Joystiq Interview

The Nintendo Office

Vote for our video, "The Nintendo Office"

If you've got a second, please head over to http://www.nintendoshortcuts.com and vote for The Nintendo Office, out entry into the Nintendo Short Cuts Showcase contest.

Thanks!

The Luigi Story

Now you can see the "award winning" short online:

Jon Favreau Should Be Your Hero

He took this:

And turned it into this:

It looks like it leapt right of the page. Keep in mind that this is the first version of the Iron Man costume. He get into his classy red and gold duds later in the film. Now if only the rest of you director's would follow Mr. Favreau's method: take the picture and turn it into a costume. I'm talking to you Sam Raimi.

The "Lost Curse"

Here's an article I recently read:

Josh Holloway [TV's Lost star "Sawyer"] calls it the 'Lost Curse': Three cast members on his hit ABC show have been arrested for auto-related incidents and another six cited. The actor, however, says there may be other factors explaining the rash of police activity.

"We're easy targets," Holloway, 36, laughingly complains in the British edition of Glamour's April issue.

Holloway, who received a speeding ticket in Hawaii in September, says: "I told 'em they should be embarrassed about giving me a ticket for doing 53 in a 35 zone. I mean, come on! Go catch real criminals!"

Lost star Adewale Akinnuoye-Agbaje, who played Mr. Eko, was arrested in September for disobeying a police officer and driving without a license. He posted $500 bail and was released after spending just over six hours in jail.

In December 2005, Michelle Rodriguez and Cynthia Watros were arrested within minutes of each other on drunken-driving charges. Both pleaded guilty. Rodriguez is currently wearing an alcohol-detecting ankle bracelet after serving 65 hours in an Oahu jail for the DUI arrest and then another four hours and 20 minutes behind bars in Los Angeles after violating probation due to her arrest.

In a post on her Web site last month, Rodriguez complained the bracelet "is like a freaking VCR, and why do they care if I drink, what am I gonna do, drink and walk over someone, I have no license."

Six other Lost cast members have been cited for car-related incidents, but not arrested. Besides Holloway's speeding ticket, Dominic Monaghan has been pulled over twice for speeding and was also cited for driving without a license. Naveen Andrews has received two speeding tickets and Ian Somerhalder (who is no longer on the show) has one. And during a safety check in Honolulu, Harold Perrineau Jr. was ticketed for having no motor vehicle insurance.

I've got a better phrase to replace "Lost Curse." It's called BREAKING THE LAW. 53mph in a 35 zone? Yeah, that's a speeding ticket. Driving without a liscense? Very illegal. Driving under the influence? You deserve every second of jail time. The only thing that fame has to do with this is their misunderstanding that their status renders this type of behavior as permissable. Who'd a thought that out of two Sawyers, my dog would be the smarter one.

Test Footage

Here's some test footage for the next film:

What's next?

I don't want to give too much away this early, but if you want to know the next story I suggest you listen to a few songs:

1) The Times They Are A-Changin' (Dylan song performed by Keb Mo)
2) The Long and Winding Road (Beatles song performed by Ray Charles)
3) The Scientist (Coldplay performed by Coldplay)

All available on iTunes of course.

The Story Behind the Film

I haven't been particularly discreet about my negative critique of Superman Returns. I've posted at least three blog entries explaining it's shortcomings.

I think I've been a bit too hard on the film.

Here's why. I watched a lot of the behind-the-scenes features on the film tonight. Within a few short minutes I noticed a few things about the cast and crew, Brandon Routh especially: they worked RIDICULOUSLY hard, treated the history and character with utmost respect, and had a lot of fun making it. How can I tear down an effort like that? Now I realize you're supposed to judge a film strictly on the film itself, but if that were how every film were judged, Captain Blasto wouldn't have received a fraction of the positive response it has.

A lot of people pull for Captain Blasto because of the story behind it. A first time director, a small crew, $7,000 budget, etc. Now that I've taken a closer look at the story behind Superman Returns, I suddenly found myself pulling for them. More than that all I could think of is, "I want to be there. I want to be working with them." They really were trying to make a great film. Did they miss the mark? Yes unfortunately. But it wasn't from lack of effort.

A great film is a stroke of magic that many directors will NEVER experience. Even Spielberg hasn't been able to call that magic at will. Lucas, with his billions, can't buy it. It can't be planned on. You can only try your damndest. And for the amazing attempt I was previously unaware of, an attempt that resulted in an decent film with some incredible moments, I'll support the next film wholeheartedly.

In the future I'm going to make sure I look further into the how the film was made before advertising it's faults.

Why Waste Your Time?

Back when George Lucas was under HEAVY criticism for his ridiculously boring return to filmmaking with The Phantom Menace, he was often heard using the excuse: I have to get through the boring part of the story to get to the good stuff.

Years later I read any interview by one half of the writing due behind another ridiculously boring film, Superman Returns. Here's what he has to say.

"I know that Bryan [Singer, the director] has said he's going to Wrath of Khan it, and by that he means, 'Let's take what we've already established--we've gotten that out of the way--and let's just make it shorter, tighter and more action-packed."

Get through the boring part? Get that out of the way? Here's a question: why even make that part? Why waste the time, money, and energy? Why have an entire film of exposition just to get to a sequel? Go right to the "good" movie and build what little exposition we actually need into it. Or better yet, show that incredible talent that got you to that point and make the boring movie exciting. Now when I say exciting I do not mean more explosions. I mean more power, more emotion. Even a quiet scene can be more powerful than a asteriod collision.

Audiences should NEVER be asked to sit through a boring scene to get to and exciting one, let alone and ENTIRE FILM.

Inherited Imagery

I've been reading alot of Joseph Campbell recently. He's best known for his studies on mythology and was made widely known to recent generations by his published conversations with George Lucas. In his book Primitive Mythology he discusses an idea brought about by a study conducted on newborn birds. As I read it, I couldn't help but connect his idea to the image of Colin being entranced by the strength and feats of Captain Blasto, or my own infatuation with Superman.

A wooden hawk would be flown over a baby chick by a string. The chick would instantly hide in fear. A wooden duck would be flown over the same chick and it would remain calm. Several different shapes of varying bird species were tried, but only the hawk would illicit the fearful behavior. The chick has NEVER seen a hawk, but still it is equipped with the instincts to take flight from it. The question posed by Campbell is this: if all hawks ceased to exist, would the chick still fear it's image?

Another question was also raised: what images may lie buried within animals and(or) man which they are equipped to fear, but have since vanished? Should those images suddenly reappear in some form, even art, would it illicit some seemingly irrational behavior? Does a child fear the image of a witch because they read fairy tales as a child? Or was there some creature long ago that are instincts tell us should be avoided?

The reverse of this idea, images that we are drawn to, could also be true. Take the imagery of super-heroes for example. Am I life long Superman fan because he was "given" to me in toys and movies as a child? Or were some great and terrible figures once present among humanity which we as children are inheritantly equipped to be in awe of? The idea of a super-hero is by no means new. It's traced down through characters like Hercules and Beowulf. Have we always been drawn to these characters, as the popular notion suggests, because they represent what we wish we were or could be? Or do generations keep rendering these ideas into our art because deep down it's written into each of us, although all traces of them once existing are now gone?