Sore Throat From Beyond Space

Damn cold.

I actually missed two days of work this week due to this sore throat/cold/flu thing I've got - those of you who know me know that missing work during annual catalog AND spring schedule production means I'm feeling pretty awful.

They actually closed down an area elementary school recently because over half of the kids were all home sick. Yikes.

Mike Hegg sent me a proof dub of TRAILER PARK DOUBLE WIDE TRILOGY OF TERROR...on DVD-R no less! How supercool! Thanks, Mike!!! It looks/sounds good and I have to admit I had a fun time watching it again. Perhaps it will work well as a "beer and pizza" movie. More news soon...

Tim Davis sent me a photo of a model/actress he's cast in the opening for ZOMBIE LOVE SLAVE. Pretty hot. He's hoping to shoot soon...

Vista Street Entertainment says that SWEET PAMELA (aka UNDERBELLY) is streaming on the net. They're supposed to get back to me with more details.

A John Bowker-directed movie I was director of photography on called THE SEEKERS is part of a new DVD multipack called "Bad Taste Theater: Even Worse Than Evil."



Wish I had more movie stuff to report. Hoping to be well soon...

Heeeeeeeere's Buggy!

OK, here's my son operating the mandibles on the UnderBug. He picked out a picture of some South American giant beetle in one of his books as the inspiration, helped with the paper mache' and even helped paint it. I think the eyes cost me $4, and I did buy a small can of black paint (which I only used about 5% of for this project) for a few bucks, but everything else was basically free: empty soda bottles, cardboard, duct tape, newspaper, flour and water.



Meanwhile, I did end up shooting the last bit of wraparound sequence for TWISTED FATES with Dee and Jon last Friday. Thanks to audio problems and a lot of driving back and forth to work around it, it took about 4 hours longer than it should have! But at least it's done.

Mike Hegg got busy with stuff in Portland, so he plans to mail me a proof dub of TRAILER PARK TRILOGY OF TERROR.

Tim Davis reports that he plans to schedule the ZOMBIE LOVE SLAVE opening shoot "in a few weeks."

I've been fighting a cold all week, so not much progress on any movie stuff.

Damn.

Tarpo!

I'll have to snap a picture of the UnderBug and post it (thanks for the suggestion, John), but here is the Creature From the Black Lagoon-inspired monster suit I made for about ten bucks, modelled by my son who really digs it!

Moving Ahead

It looks like I'll be shooting the remainder of the TWISTED FATES wraparound sequence this Friday night. I also talked to Mike Hegg on Monday and he plans to come down Friday night with what we hope to be the final proof dub of TRAILER PARK DOUBLE WIDE TRILOGY OF TERROR. Fingers crossed...

The UnderBug

This weekend, my son and I painted the paper mache bug monster head, which he has dubbed "The UnderBug" (since in the story, it lives 'under' the house). It does indeed look creepy with moving mandibles and four glass eyes, originally meant for taxidermy purposes - I picked those up at Archie McPhee in Seattle.

What's Up Right Now...About A Month Later...

TRAILER PARK DOUBLE WIDE TRILOGY OF TERROR - Mike is off on a holiday trip until early January, so I'll have to bug him about this project when he gets back.

ZOMBIE LOVE SLAVE - Tim had to cancel yet another planned shoot for this. Sigh. He claims he still wants to and will do it. Hope to have an update on this soon.

TWISTED FATES - Even after multiple e-mails & messages left on her voicemail, I never heard another peep from Heidi Martinuzzi after her last-minute second cancellation - and big surprise: she never did send back the money I advanced her for travel. I finally just ponied up the money to the bank to put a stop-payment on the check, but what a f**king pain in the ass. Other than that, have managed to let this project sit on hold over the holidays. Plan to run a couple of ads in the local college paper in January to cast an actress for this and perhaps build up a pool of actresses for other projects.

MONSTER ANTHOLOGY - Last year about this time, I shot most of a horror short with my buddy John Bowker and my son about a monster living under a family's house. Afterwards, my son and I worked on building a paper mache bug monster head to be used for the effects shots. We're finally getting around to finishing that up while he is off from school. Meanwhile, Laura Giglio (pictured below), best known for her work with W.A.V.E. productions (http://www.wavemovies.com), shot most of a ghost-themed short for me a few months back. She is set to shoot a few pick-ups sometime in early 2005 and my hope is to put these together with some other shorts for some sort of monster-themed anthology.

Merry Christmas

Last weekend turned out to be a bust movie-wise, as a location I was thinking of using would've been unavailable. Just as well as I would've been throwing the shoot together at the last minute.

I've decided to just coast through the holiday season and get back to Twisted Fates casting/planning/shooting/etc. in January. The holidays are busy enough as it is anyway.

More later...

It's always something...

Finally heard back from Heidi Martinuzzi. Long story short she's not going to be able to do the movie, so the weekend's shoot is essentially cancelled. I say essentially because there are a few other parts of the movie I may try and pull together and shoot instead. I need to make some phone calls tonight and see what might be possible.

As far as recasting Heidi's part, I need to sit and think about this for a bit. I initially had someone cast from the midwest way back when this segment was going to be shot by someone in Illinois. When that all fell through and I was convinced to shoot this segment myself, I made contact with an actress from LA, but after several messages not returned, I moved on. Then Heidi was on board for a mid-October shoot, but had to cancel. We rescheduled for this weekend, but now that's history as well. I may just run an ad in the local college paper as I did with UNDERBELLY. Need to sit and think about it a bit...

What's Up Right Now?

TRAILER PARK DOUBLE WIDE TRILOGY OF TERROR - this horror anthology was started way back in 1997 and basic videography was finished a few years later (segments were shot here and there between other projects). It's been edited for about 3 years now. My BLOODSUCKING REDNECK VAMPIRES partner, Mike Hegg, has had it for a while now, adding a couple of credits, tweaking the sound levels and rendering it with a "filmlook" kind of process. Mike is one heck of a busy guy but I'm hoping he'll be able to dub out a master for me soon and I can get some copies made. At this point, it's a tad embarassing quality-wise since I've learned so much since this was shot. It will be nice to see it out soon, though.

ZOMBIE LOVE SLAVE - this oddball featurette (about 30 minutes long) is a somewhat plotless series of zombie attacks shot over the course of several years (started back in 2000). It's been edited for at least a year now, but I've been waiting for Tim Davis to shoot an opening sequence he really wanted to do. He keeps having to cancel shoots due to models flaking out or his own schedule conflicts. As soon as Tim can shoot the opening, this project can quickly fly towards release.

TWISTED FATES - another horror anthology, this one is filled with plot twists hence the name. Ron Ford shot one segment I wrote back over Memorial Day weekend 2003! Since then, I've shot 90% of the wraparound but have run into all manner of scheduling/casting problems with shooting the "VideoDrone" segment. As of this very moment, I'm scheduled to shoot the bulk of that segment this coming weekend with Heidi Martinuzzi coming up from Los Angeles. I haven't been able to get a hold of her for about 2 weeks now so I'm getting worried.

OTHER STUFF - I've been working on a few scripts off and on: bigfoot, aliens, vampires, apes, astronauts, ghosts, etc., etc. I always seem to have about 10 projects running through my brain at any given time. Now is no exception.

Hope to have more news on these and other projects soon...

The First Post

I've hesitated starting a blog since I'm not sure how often I'll update it (and update is the name of the game on the web). However it does seem to make sense as a place to post news about the various movie and other projects I always have swarming around my head.

So...

Here I am.