Time Can Fly Like A Bird.....and as for LO2

   So as you may or may not know I've been scripting a movie with my two Co. Directors; for LO2 (The Legend of Two). We used to get an episode-of 60-written every couple days, now it seems like we haven't written one in a long time. I came to a realization awhile back that we have a month to two months to finish the script and we are no where near.
   We started many of months back but have just been overwhelmed. We plan to start filming 1-2 months before school gets out and time has just flown by. We have the whole outline but...we need more time is all.
   A few months back we learned that Tim a great friend of mine, and close companion to Filming Humor was moving to Texas. We always wanted to get a video made before he left but he will be gone as of this Saturday. You may remember him as Vader from Earth Wars, or Gregory from The Spaztastic News, he also played numerous roles in side videos.

   It's a great loss that will be heavily impacting and will take some time to recover from, he was definitely a guy to call upon when a new video was going to be made, or if we had an extra spot open. It would have been nice to have him in LO2 as there are a ton of roles and parts that still need occupying.

As for LO2:
   So this plot has like a bazillion characters, most of which die, lots of foreshadowing, and as much epic as you could possibly imagine. The plot has nearly a bazillion places where we need to go for on location, not to mention all the other complications....such as the editing hassle. We don't plan to release the video series for nearly half a year after we finish filming and the effects are so far beyond us right now it is unbelievable. I mean I practice from time to time and try to learn to do super power effects but it is difficult.

This is the as of now logo...will likely go back into construction for a makeover.

   I want a better camera, not that I don't have a nice HD camera but it could be so much better....but then I'd also like to get AE (After Effects) as that would also be very helpful. Now I haven't yet got to my point of interest. This is a long freaking movie, hour and a half about, and if we are successful, which I fully intend to be, I'd want to take a step further then YouTube with this video. Either selling maybe it as a DVD or something else...but that means we need probably better quality....which means a better camera...gah, so confusing this must be.
   Because I always like to tell the history of LO2 here it goes. So one day, about a year ago,i had an idea for a stick fight I could make, drew it up in class, they had super powers. I then went to design a plot for how they got their powers and their saving of the world. At this point in time I was not really big into making movies...more animations actually...but I was in video editing class and made great work with windows movie maker. I actually didn't have a camera either so the idea that I would get anywhere was over my head.
   My friend Ethan and my other friend Erik were going to play the main characters. Ethan being as crazy as you know him to be (created the idea to The Spaztastic News among many others like Earth Wars) had to take my plot and twist it into a new. From the kind peaceful plot it was turned into a druggie based movie that probably would have been terrible. The first filming was spectacular in that it was hilarious and I wish I could release it but am incapable due to the fact that Ethan would more or less chop off my head and throw it in a sewer then burn my body...
   Anyway, we scrapped that version because Ethan became to busy to film. But you have to remember that the only directing experience before the filming was a little for a Romeo Juliette skit for school. But before we scrapped it we assumed Ethan would be back and filmed a whole scene without him and kept his name in use but when it came time for the next filming he was gone and so we brought in Dylan who then played Ethan. This got pretty far but eventually failed as summer came because Dylan was soon a lost cause during the summer when no one could get in contact with him.
   Eventually LO2 was scrapped. Until I met my friend Chase and learned that we both enjoyed video production and then teamed up with Ethan (who came back into video as of summer) and created Filming Humor. From there we made a series of skits and other random videos.
   LO2 went back into production about a month and a half before the end of summer with Chase and I exchanging the original plot outline and making changes as needed to the point of perfection. We removed all that Ethan had added that made it bad, and reset the plot scenes and everything the Original LO2 was.
   Google Wave had just come around soon afterward; Chase, Ethan and I took advantage and started the scripting of every scene. We changed from having two main characters as two males to a male and female who pick on each other in a funny fashion and came to a splendid point. We started recruiting people we thought fit character roles, set new guidelines and planned for everything to be without flaw as to avoid all bumps we faced last time.
   From there we are here, and yet we still have nearly a year until we will release the video, but such a short time that is.

Thanks For Reading
The Director,

Spoofing The History Channel

   Quite a feat it was. When looking to make a movie there isn't usually a deadline unless you want there to be. This is an occasion when time was of the essence.

Prep Work:
   Original intentions were unclear, we were given a week and a half notice, but didn't learn we could work with partners until a week prior. With one week and counting we rushed to get ideas together and had filming underway that evening. We all knew that this project for our English class didn't have to be as extravagant as we were making it but we were going to have fun with it, and we were going to blow the competing power-points out of the water.
   The assignment was to compare Ibo culture to that of our own. Our first ideas were sketchy, but we eventually settled with Ethan's idea of spoofing The History Channel. We choose to compare religion because we wanted to hit on all the topics, but the only way to do this was to use a wide range topic, and religion fit the bill. From there we planned out speeches and skits to play over the audio.
   Making costumes was a bit fun. We had a lot of supplies just laying around...an old shield, a black table cloth and a tin foil sword. Each of these was modified for the purposes of the video. The old shield became a mask by cutting holes into it and painting it. The black table cloth became a robe & headband, the tin foil sword became a cross. From there we took some paints and attempted to make black, but it came out as purple; until the second filming. Which was two days prior to the release, where we made a successful black. Other costumes were fresh to the market.
Filming:
   I have a 16GB SD card, it can hold nearly four hours of video, we almost used it all up. Day one of filming we shot mostly the short skits to go over the video which took quite a bit of time. And the second day we shot all the speeches as well as a few more skits. We filmed for a total of about seven hours, which isn't all that much.
   One of the more interesting parts of filming was the cold. The temperature may have been 65F but when you factor in wind chill and rain it seems closer to freezing. When we shot the arrival of the Christians, which was out in a leaking canoe, we had to get out in the even colder water where our feet soon became numb. We wanted to show the canoe as though it were out at sea. So we got the canoe a bit out and Ethan and Tim got in the canoe, I stood out in the cold water.
   When you plan to put someone on the screen four times it is best to have some careful planning. Ethan got dressed up like an Egwugwu and we then shot him entering the screen four different times. Now I'm not trying to complain or anything but Ethan and Tim often think very highly of my editing skills, some times too much. So Ethan keeps walking out on screen and I keep reminding him, don't cross into "the area". We had way to many takes of this, but it is a learning experience.
   The green screen; you would be surprised what you can do with one of these. I don't mean to boast but I nearly have it down to a science. So the first day we filmed just a little on the screen, but what we forgot to do was remove this object from leaning up against it which messed with the shading and added a big object in the background! But it wasn't to bad, I fixed it nicely. The second day I was sure to get it all right, and we did many a things to make it look a bit more professional. Such as changing the positioning of the chair, getting close ups; among other shots.
Editing:
   Would you believe me if I told you I spent about 14 hours editing and would have prefered another five for finishing touches. So yes it was a great movie, but for the first day of it's release I had a bazillion things I whished to fix. Although I am now over it I would have prefered to have removed the picture of weed, and could have shortened some of the talking parts. Pretty much everyone who has seen it was highly impressed with the work, and I'm glad it turned out so well and more importantly glad the class liked the presentation.
   Getting to show off some new techniques was fun. More recently I learned to use this effect in Primiere call "Roughen Edges." Basically you add that on top of the green screen mask and you achieve removal of the green glow. I'll admit that there was still a bit of green glow, but it fooled many people into believing that the speaking shots were filmed on a real book case.
Final Words:
   I'm pleased, liked having a deadline and we achieved what we shot for; a great grade and blowing everyone else out of the water. My family has sent the video off to their friends because their impressed and their friends enjoyed it which is pleasing. Ethan still a bit to embarassed to show his mom, but my mom later informed me that she sent it to Ethan's mom anyway...haha.
   I learned from this a new techniqe for video that I knew but never had a chance to incorperate. But for the most part I learned to incorporate this technique succesfully. This technique I am reffering to is the ability to place video over the speaker which is a big thing in the history channel theme. Therefore I was forced into learnig it, and learning it well. I realize now that back when we did our news that this technique would have improved the videos ten fold if not more. Plus everything else we now know how to do and we would have been well on our way to a great series.
   In a conclusion everything was extreamly well made, and a three teamed video project takes some work but we pulled it off with flying colors and will further use this in the production of LO2 [which most of everyone doesn't know exists, so click the linck to read a short post about it]. As that is all tell me what you think of the video and what you think could be improved.

Thanks For Reading
The Director,

The Earth Wars Series

Call me crazy, but I am glad it's over...

   It has been over half a year since the first attempt at Earth Wars. I took a look back through my notes and was surprised to find that the original name was going to be Bay Wars. The name was changed because I didn't want to focus on the bay. There are a lot of different things prior to the first attempt at creating Earth Wars, and even more to the second and final attempt.
   When I say attempt I literally mean attempt, there was no guarantee that we would get the video fully created; the final version took two days of filming. One day for the basic stuff (parts 1 & 2) and another day for the more complicated fight scenes (part 3 & 4). In fact it was originally only supposed to be one 10 minute video, which then formed into the idea of having a three part series. But in reality it became a four part series.
   One of the major changes that happened between attempt one and two was when we got an HD camera; which in some ways is better, but not all. What I'm getting at here is something you might have noticed in episode four. Did you, in the very last scene, see how the lighting changes tremendously. Well there is a reason for this, and it has to do with the options available; but the camera too. For one, the last part was filmed at attempt one with a camera that can go down to 0lux (lighting adjustment). So we could in effect film at all hours of the day and capture great footage. *paragraph down below where I will expand on this. When we filmed at attempt two : day two, we were filming at night with our new HD camera, but it can't go to 0lux, which means we can't film past deep sunset. We had filmed a very similar scene to the one in the video with minor adjustments, but we couldn't use it because the lighting was to the point of darkness that the saber was all you could see. That is a problem, but we didn't see this until less than a week prior to the release of the video, and with no chance of getting to re-film it, I, using my brain, decided to use some of the old footage because it was all we had. So in the end it turned out quite nicely, but you know what, no one is perfect, and we are just a work in progress, learning as we go. *my section below talks about all that we learned during the creation of Earth Wars.
   Now I wont say Earth Wars was the best it could have been, almost every episode was edited the day prior to release (major procrastination). But I will admit to the fact that I believe it was a well made thorough video that could have been made better if we were to remake it. What I'm getting at is that because this video is obviously are best work we have gone to a level of marketing that we have never reached before. [Side note before I finish this paragraph, from part one to part four, the skills in editing had changed so dramatically, that it was incredible, but not only did the editing improve, our field work also increased a lot as well. We have grown in so many different way it is all in preparation for the big Kahuna, LO2 - the biggest project we can imagine at this point.]
   So what is it that we have done to advertise this series that we did not do prior? Well for one, advertising was not something we did a whole lot of anyway. But we did take about several step leading to our final professional leap in advertising. It is in my opinion that free advertising can be majorly efficient, some times the market is unaware you are even marketing to them. How can this be you may ask? Well for one it's called "viral", which means the video is being spread via email and social networks. I sent off many emails about this series to friends, family, even teachers. They would like the series so much they would beg to know about the next ones release. This is very effective and the views are 'strong' views.
   Another good way in which you can advertise is a sort of force feeding mechanism. I was never a fan of it, still I disprove of it and use it as little as possible, but it works and we did it, please don't judge. Sending your targeted audience a video might seem a bit of a weird approach to marketing but it works quite well. Say my target audience is a bunch of Star Wars junkies, how do you find them? First you search YouTube for popular Star Wars videos, "Yoda Fight Scenes" is a good choice, I actually got my video as a response to that video which is another form of advertising (basically the video gets shown below the video so viewers will see it after they watch the video, and seeing as this video had over a million views this was a prime location). After you have a location of people, simply copy their username, compose a message, explain why they might like it, and attach the video, send it and you might just have a view.
   We used many others that I'm not willing to admit to because I never plan to use them again and they go against my morals. But what we have now got running and in place are a some popular techniques of marketing that cost minor amounts of money but are completely worth the cost. What I'm talking about is both the Facebook advertising system and the YouTube advertising system, both of which are way more extensive then I first imagined.
   The Facebook advertising system allows me to choose specific demographics to target and basically I could choose down to a single individual if I so wanted to target. It also gives you advanced tools and options to watching how the ad preforms. The YouTube advertising system is not as specific about the demographic but you are targeting based on search queries and other misc. items. YouTube offers a even more extensive tracking of your ads performance. For each of these services I set my price and the resulting effect follows likewise. All in all I am over excited to be using these two wonderful programs.

Major Learning Curve:
   Throughout the course of filming we learned so much incredible information it was insane to think we didn't know that back then. From editing to on location film preparation, we faced difficulties and tasks impossible prior to now. But I think it is all just how we will learn, how we will prepare, and like I said before this is our first taste into the making of the big goal, The Legend of Two (LO2). But where will we be in four months when we start the filming of LO2, will we be even further improved will we have better equipment? I have no idea, but I am excited, as the future is so untold even though I like to make it seem as though I know it...
-Flashes & Clashes
   This was more of a Star Wars related only task but it shows just what can be done. When I first started I had no idea how to build a successful flash on the screen, in fact in part three you will notice that I just put a picture of a spark on top of the clash. But as I soon after learned by using the lighting effects I could simply place a big flash outwards of the clash, and it turned out quite nicely. I had it down to the point where  I could do five or so flashes a minute; pretty good compared to the original two flashes a minute.
-Lighting
   This is more or less something we just need to pay more attention to next time. I can do a lot of things inside of the editing, but the really good video is when the least amount of editing is needed. I learned, from a professional in the trade, awhile back, over the summer, that there is a certain time in the morning that is perfect for filming, it's known as magic hour. Everything is just right and makes for good shot. But that's besides the point, lighting is important and we are more in tune with this.
-Speed Clips
   In an old post I described this, but I'll just reiterate its importance. The main reason for being an editor is to shorten clips, I never really took this to heart, but it truly is key. To make a good video it need to be short, snappy, flowing, and the more cuts the more you have the viewers attention; of course it must look good.
-Audio Offset
   A problem we use to have but no longer have but had to face again which I hated was when the audio is offset. Before our new camera we use to record to tape, unfortunately tape means dropped frames, which means audio offset. This was probably a bit noticeable if you watch the end of part four carefully. But it's all good, another thing I was able to do in audio was at the beginning of part four I took some audio from attempt one at filming. I then placed this on top of the video and was able add more emotions to the video, I thought it turned out nicely.
-Costumes
   We have always enjoyed making up costumes, but this was the first time we really got into it. We made Yoda Ears, the Vader "box" and we even painted my face green to look like Yoda. There wasn't anything really learned, but it was fun. Although we faced an unfortunate loss of Yoda's ears when Ethan thought it would be a good idea to chuck them in the water, which is why the Yoda scene is so short.
-Choreography
   Probably one of the most incredible advances in our filming. Ethan took the role as choreographer, and did a mighty fine job. When you watch footage from the first time and the second you see a significant improvement, and the best thing about choreography is it makes camera work easy. Sometimes Ethan had the shot plan, or I would just circle around with the camera. And we could re-film it over and over because everything was the same. Back in the original LO2 we tried to do this but failed, I'm so glad it is working now...
-Plug Ins
   Not used in Earth Wars, but I did learn about them.They basically can be used to further your editor, in my case premiere. I may or may not start using some.

I enjoyed making this project and am looking forward to future projects. If you still haven't seen it there is a player at the top of this post.

Thanks For Reading

The Director,