Brand New Trailer

I cut a new trailer for Purgatory Comics and deleted the original . . . because this one is harder better faster stronger (as Daft Punk would say). You'll see the end is similar, and some clips make it in again . . . but I wanted to make more of an effort creating a narrative this time around. I was hoping that the select clips would better help people understand what the film is about. Plus unlike the first trailer, this one's in anamorphic widescreen with the color/sound corrections in place.

And if you'd like to download a higher-res version (compatible with your ipod or Apple TV), just click below. Hope you like it!

Purgatory Comics Official Trailer (2008) Download

Finished.

"Quitting my day job and starting my life as a writer was a tremendous risk. It was a fool's leap, a shot in the dark. But anything of any value in our lives, whether that be a career, a work of art, a relationship, will always start with such a leap. In order to be able to make it, you have to put aside the fear of failing and the desire of succeeding. You have to do these things completely pure; without fear, without desire. Because things that we do without lust or result are the purest actions that we shall ever take."

-Alan Moore

Film's done. To those who stuck with me the whole way, thank you. Stay tuned, the journey is only getting started. More soon!

Screenwriting Championships

I mentioned a few blogs back that I'm in a screenwriting contest. They give you a genre, location, and item, and you have a very short amount of time to write a 5-page script that works in all of those elements. You then win anywhere between 0-25 points, and you progress to the next round. For the first go, I had to write a political satire that took place in a tattoo parlor, and incorporated and construction hat. Yikes. That was a month ago, but Friday the scores came in and I got 22 points. Woohoo!

I had a week to write that first script, but on Friday they gave us the second assignment, and only two days to do it. So today I wrote some historical fiction that took place at a waterfall, and incorporated a tablecloth. I have to say I wasn't thrilled with my script for the first round, but I'm excited about the one I wrote today. Maybe I'll post it in the future. We'll see what the judges think about it . . . if they like it and I get enough points, I progress again in December. If not, I'm out.

I bought some materials this weekend to make "press kits" for the movie, which I'm halfway through with my "final viewing." So expect the next blog to be titled, "Finished!"

I Need Some Sleep

Even after my harsh blog about it, I have to hand it to LaCie . . . they have some swell customer service. The guy on the phone was nice and they honored my warranty without hassle (I had read some horror stories online, so I was worried about that). I sent the drive Saturday and got it back, repaired, today. Of course the data was gone. Now the returned drive has become my backup, so once again we're operating with a safety net.

Mike was over Sunday again to finish his color/contrast corrections. However we hit a slight snag. Last blog I wrote about how the film switched to anamorphic widescreen. It turns out the filter we used for that might cause some issues later on while we're converting to DVD (it's a long technical story that I can barely follow), so I had to manually create the new borders and reframe every single shot one-by-one. It's easy, but very tedious. However I'm over 2/3 done already and I'm actually catching some errors by examing each clip this way (i.e. a few we forgot to apply color corrections too, etc). At this point I'm estimating I'll be done by the weekend. With the whole movie. Yay! I'll let you know...

Now in Anamorphic Widescreen!

Last Sunday Mike LaVoie was over and he started working on the film's color/contrast levels. Thankfully it didn't need a whole lot of work since it was shot and lit really well for the most part, even with the tight time restraints we were under. Mike was enthusiastic about a last minute idea to adjust the film's widescreen aspect ratio to 2.35:1, which is considered to be anamorphic widescreen (aka scope). The advantages of this are many, including the fact that this is the preferred ratio of hi-def features (check out your bluray discs). This is also a good ratio for blowing up the film for projections, and it will further help Purgatory Comics stand out from other indie flicks. Mike returns this Sunday to finish the job.

Here are some screen shots for the film in scope. This is the exact ratio the movie will be presented in. I will say though that the colors of these stills don't do it justice...thanks to Mike and John, this is a beautifully vibrant movie, which is all the more reason I want as many people as possible to see it in hi-def. Click the images to enlarge:

This thing is 99% done! I make jokes that I could nitpick it forever, but I'm actually pretty satisfied with what I'm seeing. After this weekend we'll start planning for a release. Exciting times! I think I'll also either whip out a new trailer or recut the old one...not sure yet...

Another Crash

My cousins and I used to draw comic books when we were little. It was the most fun in the world. Back then, all we needed was paper and a pencil; we weren't at the mercy of anything else. Sometimes I yearn for the days when my creativity could function without such utter dependence on technology - especially expensive technology.

That said, last weekend another one of my drives crashed. I got it back from the editor and connected it to my computer that night. I copied everything to my backup and then went to bed. The next morning I booted up the primary, and it literally sounded like there was a lawnmower inside (plus the computer won't recognize it). Now my backup is my primary, and I have no backup (worse case scenario, my editor has a backup on his system). I learned much from the last crash so this didn't halt production at all. Mike LaVoie still came last weekend and we worked as planned.

I am now going on record and stating that I am no longer buying LaCie hard drives. I've had four, and two have crashed. Sure, the first tipped over (I still maintain it should've been able to handle that). However this other faulty drive, which I bought in August mind you, has not seen any impact. It should work. Tomorrow will be my customer service adventure, but even if it's wiped and fixed, I can't see myself trusting this brand ever again. A quick google search will find you similar stories by fedup customers...some forced to pay thousands to recover data because they had no backups.

Warm Milk Productions Inc. is done with LaCie. I suggest you future filmmakers and other big-file users do the same, or proceed at your own risk. This is truly unacceptable.

Angela is Somewhat Photogenic

As I mentioned in the last post, the other week we had a mini-photoshoot out at Hidden Pixels Photo, courtesy of Vanessa Zimmer and Benn Fielding. We chose which pictures we like the most and Benn's been touching them up for poster art. Below is the first Side Panels mini-doc since maybe eight months ago. It's super short, but you'll get a look at the photoshoot last week.

I got my hard drive back from John so the whole film is once again in my possession. Tomorrow I'm meeting with DP Mike LaVoie, who's going to watch it and maybe do some more contrast/brightness type corrections. He hasn't seen it since my very first rough cut back in February, so hopefully he'll think there have been huge improvements.

It's nice to have momentum again. This is a very gray area for me though and it needs to be handled delicately. I'll drop a nice "what next" blog in the coming days but right now I'm just going to relax and watch a movie.