IT'S ALREADY MARCH!!!???!??? oh my...

I was going to post this back after we were done with The Spies, but I got busy with school...




Well it's over. The Spies has been released, and like I said when I finished Earth Wars, "I'm glad it's over."

This project took a long time, from the first conceptions, to arranging the actors, actually getting around to filming it, and then a whole month in post production. Wow!

At 3am Friday I was so relieved to have finished it. It's that joy that you get from being done. I was fully aware of the fact that with another week I could have fixed some of the minor issues. But also aware to the fact that this was the greatest video yet!
That wasn't too important after realizing all that you've learned.
It's always true that after a project you could make the film better, but all that really means is you will do better next time.

Actually I am really pleased with this video. And everyone else seemed really happy with it too. I figure I'll be looking back on this one positively for about ever; like Jeremy & The Cookies.

If you haven't yet seen The Spies, here it is http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8Qn75rWNAec




Anyhow, that was then, I still like The Spies, but I will always hate how rushed we were on the last bit of filming in the graveyard, so we didn't get enough footage, which is why the last three minutes are difficult to watch. And then there are some confusing things... specifically the Tom Tom Tele Major, which is what the glass jar was. It allows you to teleport... and well, we don't need to try and understand the rest of it....

Anyhow, if you follow us on some of the other networks like Dailybooth, Twitter, or Facebook you may have heard about the shocking news...we're making a sequel! haha
Actually that's pretty exciting for me considering it's a chance to build the characters more and expand the story line... if we had enough time to film the sequel I'd make it longer. And then another interesting thing about the sequel is it's not going for as much action as it is suspense. But there will be action, we're just going to try and make a very suspenseful film... hopefully 15mins long. I'll update you more on that later.

Other than that we've been having fun parties, working on the cooking series Gettin' Tasty (with Ducky and Cambridge).

Anyhow, I may add some updates after this if I can remember anything cool that's going on... haha


Thanks for reading,

Alex Chandler

December Update

    What's new with you...? That's almost a rhetorical question, but if you want you can answer in the comments.. haha

   I've just been working on The Spies. Which has been interesting to say the least. There is this tip I learned from Andrew Kramer (VideoCoPilot), basically it is P.E.R.F.E.C.T. This acronym will help make really really good video (specifically compositing), but when I was working on T (Timing), I came to realize that we aren't very good at it. What will make The Spies worse than our next video will be that the timing of shots wasn't well planned, and it was too fast. We try to keep to about three seconds a shot. But some of the scenes in The Spies needed slower shot time. While we can speed things up in post production, we have a difficult time with slowing them down. Though The Spies (2010) will be a great film, comes out a week from Friday, it will be a fast paced 10 minutes, that should have been about 15-20mins.

   What I might try, but may not actually use, is to use the extra takes to show shots multiple times. This was done in the early stages of some European film (either the Russians or the Germans). But what it does. It creates this uneasy feel and it will slow a shot down quite well... I'd like to slow it down, but make it flow better, and not create unease, a lot like they do with explosions in spy films and action TV shows... I may be able to do this successfully... Wish me luck, ha

   Well what else is going down? Well LO2 looks like it will be released as a series of disconnected short films; well they are slightly connected, but not very well. This due to the fact that we want to make the movie, but we know it will be impossible to make the whole thing without serious dedication (which we can't get unfortunately).

   In preparation for LO2 we may make some sort of super hero battle sequence, or a Harry Potter inspired battle sequence. Not to sure on that...

   Then we are looking into a new series that would start up this summer called Gett'n Tasty. It's a cooking show, but we would film it whenever, release it later. Other than that we have a couple short films in conception, but nothing is really being filmed, the weather is wretched (we tried to film last weekend, way too wet, too cold for the camera, battery didn't last, and then we only got one third of the project done.. a five minute film...whatever).

   Look forward to the video on the 24th! I'm excited :D

Thanks for reading,

~Alex Chandler

The Greatest Film Day Yet!

The Spies (2010)

The Spies (2010)

To Watch The Behind The Scenes Click Here

    Yesterday was the filming of The Spies, it was predicted to be the largest film we have attempted yet, and it definitely was! You can always expect people not to be able to show up; and so three people were unable to make it. But we had my brother, Zachary Chandler, fill in those roles.
    In essence we had eight people show up for this, of a planned eleven. And we got a lot done, with the help of some strategic setups.

    What is coming from yesterdays effort? Well this coming Friday we should have a blooper / behind the scenes video coming out. Then there will be a trailer for this movie released in about a month, and sometime in December the actual video will release.

Some Important Learning Curves;

    Today was like any other day, I learned a lot. While reviewing the film I discovered that a lot of us seemed to blink a ton (maybe due to the cold) and there was way too much looking at the camera. To top that off there was the wind factor, meaning we will likely have to perform some ADR on the outside scenes.

    What to take away from this. The camera man, in this movie it was Ethan Carlson, should be watching for what peoples eyes are doing, whether that be blinking or looking at the camera (I was the worst, doing both of those a lot). Though if you are lucky enough to have a director watching from a ways away on a monitor, reviewing the footage, then you are lucky.

   With the wind, it's not like it's something I didn't know. It's more or less something that should be prevented, and prepared for. You can't hear someones voice if they are too far away, or if the camera is being hit by wind. Luckily for the first scene, a silent scene, I was able to remove all the clips audio and substitute my own (though I still have to go out and get foot steps).

   Another problem we faced was not knowing the script well enough. At the filming we tried out this new concept of having one person cook food for the actors, while another is doing up the make up, and then the rest of us are filming the scene. What does this have to do with not knowing the script? Well I think having someone who knew the script to the point where they could direct the camera man on what to do. Basically the director, but I think maybe having another scene director would work good too. But perhaps I should take it upon myself to do such. Because our script has planned out near every shot. But when things get tense and we are running low on time we can't look back at the script fast enough. And it would give us more free time if we were able to just sump into scene. Another step I had in mind for rolling through this faster is having the directors (in this case Ethan and I) go through the script before the filming actually starts and get a run down on everything.

Based Off Earth Wars;

    This film was really taking a lot of the things we learned from making the Earth Wars Series. A lot being based around just having a script for the film, and the amount of shots planned into the script. In Earth Wars much of our film was choreographed and, things were planned out around the camera. And then whenever we would be talking about the script we'd refer back to techniques we used in Earth Wars. If I had to credit one movie we did for teaching us tricks for this, you guessed it, it'd have to be Earth Wars.

Alex David Chandler is not Yet an actor...with much skill

    I found out the hard way that I'm not an actor... At least not yet! haha, while reviewing the film I could easily tell I was overly directing, though it was supposed to be Ethan's job, I was taking too much of it. In the footage I find myself looking at the camera excessively, talking about the next cut during a cut, and just a lot of really bad things for an actor to be doing...

    I figure with time I might be able to train myself to act better, but for now I'll continue playing minimal roles and just directing. Because this film was supposed to be serious and like Zachrey Manning said, "you can tell Alex isn't used to serious films." haha, it's true. There were many instances where there was 7-12 takes of me because I just couldn't keep a straight face.

Alex Chandler

Ethan Carlson; For the win!

    Luckily for this film we had Ethan Carlson directing. Before we started filming I told him that if something doesn't play across the camera right, or doesn't look good, make us retake it. And it is because of that, that I have looked over all of the footage so far, and it is fairly nice; even with all the minor mistakes.

    Ethan was also playing a character in this movie. Originally he was supposed to play the goth, but that didn't happen, but he got the role as the waiter, who was a pretty awesome character! Overall we were lucky to have him as a director on this film!

Ethan The Director and Camera Man of The Spies

    Haley Rondeau was a great asset, playing as a chef in the background as we filmed. She cooked so many pancakes! But it was all good fun and game, I'm glad we had her over.

    Mariah Puccia-McAllister came over and played the Lead Spy. That was interesting, I think she will be surprised to see how well she did acting when the film releases.

    Kalyn Erickson worked the make up side of things, creating a demon snake, the devil, and a goth. She also did some hair work for a couple characters. To top things off she played a spy character! It would have been impossible without the help put forth by Kalyn.

    Mariah Morey played the main character Jane. This was a difficult role that she did an amazing job at, to be honest she did more than two times a greater acting job than I did [as the other main spy character]. Well it was an honor to work with her talent, she was able to convey many emotions very well. You'll just have to see the video to understand how vital her skills were. (That and that of Ethan's skill, pulled this movie out of anything else it may have been).

Kalyn ~ Mariah Morey ~ Haley ~ Mariah McAllister

    Zachrey Manning played interesting characters to say the least. A Fluffy T-Rex (aka F-Rex) and a Demon Snake. The make up he had to put on was pretty hilarious! I was glad to have his help on this film. He is a self proclaimed "Blooper Creator." And I think he did a good job at that.

    And then Zachary Chandler forced into using his skill, I wasn't dissatisfied at all. I knew he had acting skill, he just used to have a very high pitched voice, but now it is all about gone, and I look forward to using his skill in future productions.In this film he plays the Goth and the Devil.

Zach Manning and Zach Chandler ~ "Zach Squared"

    

    Having reviewed the footage I feel it is safe to say this will turn out to be a fairly great movie. Everyone put a lot of awesome effort into it. And through our teamwork we will have created, more than likely, our greatest film yet.

To Team Work and Great Fun

Thanks For Reading,


~Alex Chandler