25th of November, 2011 - I was wrong

Not one page, one and a half. I wrote the second teaser today, and I think there's a nice flow between The Robber's Rose, the teasers, then the feature. I just realized it's a month until Christmas! Hooray! Recently I've been having ideas on how to do things like villages, towns and castles, but designing them will be a challenge. Hopefully a friend will be able to help with that. As for how it'd work, here in New Zealand, we don't exactly have medieval-ish-era villages, towns and castles lying all around the place, despite what you might think because of LotR. (Which I need to get the extended versions of.) Things like that either need to be contracted for real as sets... which frankly isn't in our budget... which is basically non existant. So we must improvise! Whip out that green-screen/blue-screen, and put it to work. It's well and good to find a nice landscape that you think: "Oh, wouldn't it be lovely if there were a castle there." But it's another to actually do it.

If you I were to merely show a far off distant castle that I won't need any other angles of, then I could probably get away with motion tracking and matte painting a single image. But I'd kinda like to have more than one angle, so that means the two above, plus making the places in 3D, basically at least. Easiest way for me I think would be to make it in real life- scale of course. (Wishful thinking for anything more, haha.) Then have that model on a green screen and take pictures from the angles I need to put into places. This could also be used for set extension if walls and buildings are removable to get the camera in. Then add the footage with actors and props, (Masked and/or Keyed appropriately, of course.) But even so, a fake environment is no substitute for the real thing, so I'd like to keep locations real as much as I can. Anyway, that was just an idea on a way to do a few things I had the other day... I'm sure there's loads of refining to do and trouble shooting before it were to work, haha. Anyway, Good night.

-Icey

Mountains of Parchment

16th of November, 2011 - How's it going?

Twenty-two. Hooray! The Robber's Rose, first draft, has come out at twenty-two pages, including title page. I've sent it through to my Mum to read, before I send it to a few other people. (You know who you are.) So now that that part is done, it's the minor-ish tweaking stage! Easier to get other things done at this stage. But yeah, big relief that The Robber's Rose didn't grow so rapidly like The Archer's Fable did. I believe I've said before how TAF was planned to be a short, but kinda grew in page count until it was feature-lengh. TRR thankfully has pretty much landed exactly on my word goal. The ending came out fairly nicely, leading onto the teaser I wrote for The Archer's Fable. Next, I'll write the second teaser, as that'll only be about a page.

So, less roles required for the short, by far; eight with dialog, and some of which are very minor. John, Mendel, Cassian, Bernard, Argento, Darren, Village Boy, Shady Man. Hopefully we'll be able to have a few people interested. In other news: I watched Lord of the Rings, Hooray! Awesomeness. MORE other news: Gonna start going through ha bunch of tutorials and stuff, learning after effects and playing around. Hoorah! Short update, but an update.

-Icey

Mountains of Parchment

29th of October, 2011 - Quick update

One update's better than none. It saves one whole letter in counting, too, but I guess writing the post makes up for that... Hmmm... Logic fail. Anyway, so nine pages on the short film that goes before The Archer's Fable. If you've seen the thingy near the top of the blog about page counts, you'll have noticed "The Robber's Rose" hopefully. Intriguing title, isn't it? Quite fond of it. It's origin's are somewhat amusing. I wanted to give a small story to a character that briefly appears in the first teaser I wrote for The Archer's Fable. Anyway, I've just written a little interrogation scene, and this thought came to mind, which I hope some of you at least find amusing:

"I love how people become cooperative when you threaten them with something deadly. Life just becomes so much easier for the person holding the weapon."

If you didn't find that amusing, you probably found it sounded messed up. Oh well, my head is a bit messy. Don't clean it out as regularly as my virtual trash bin, but still more regularly than my real one. Hmmm... Perhaps I'm online too much.
Anyhow, glad I posted! I'm going to Armageddon Expo tomorrow after church. Good luck to anyone doing NaNoWriMo (or equivalents) in November, just thought I'd say that.

-Icey
Mountains of Parchment

21st of October, 2011 - Goings on

I've got the first teaser trailer written for The Archer's Fable. It's one page and should be roughly a minute long, so that's great. I've also started writing a general outline of key events that need to happen Veil of Trees. (Partly because I'll feel like I'm doing more if I've got a writing project going.) My own side-projects are still going, and I've been busy making props. I do not advise ANYONE to make anything with feathers; I still need to do the vacuuming. Ooh also, over the while, I've been playing around in a 30-day trial of Adobe Production Premiere CS5.5, which has been great fun. My first couple of day worth of playing around can be seen here. Need to make some more stuff to put on my channel...

Admittedly I've also been mucking around some, playing Portal 1, Portal 2, and Minecraft. Having a little break is good. But don't worry, I'm still working on Bowstring. I don't know if I mentioned it on the blog earlier, but originally The Archer's Fable was meant to be a short that went before Veil of Trees, something my friends and I could do before working on the main film. It's an epic failure when a planned 20-30 page script turns out over 120 pages. I guess that's a good thing though... somewhat. So I've also started writing ANOTHER film short, this one slightlyyyyy before The Archer's Fable. It's basically a mission for John, and introducing a character that I hope to bring back later, and another character that makes a brief appearance in the first teaser for The Archer's Fable.

Basically what I want to do with these shorts, teasers and then the movies is develop a continual storyline. I like teasers/trailers that add to the story, somewhat like in Doctor Who series six, how some of the episodes had mini 'prequels'. That's part of what's been going through my head. It's also a nice way to fill in some gaps. So hopefully this short will turn out closer to the page goal.

Still no, heh, progress on my costume. When I have everything I need, things get done fast, but when I don't, I have a hard time not-slacking. Still thinking some on what the final design should be. I've got quite a few things to make regardless, so hopefully I'll figure that out soon. I also apologize for the lack of updates recently. I've been meaning to write posts, but it's just slipped my mind. I tend to loth writing short blog posts... Makes me feel like Iv'e got nothing to say. But then again, so do no-posts. I should just try post anyway even if there's not much to report on. And it should make me try do more on the project faster.

-Icey
Mountains of Parchment

19th of September, 2011 - Slow Progress

Haven't gotten any casting done yet. Haven't really made progress on costumes yet. Been looking up plenty of info on making props though. Script readers, only two have finished out of five, that I'm aware of. (FM and his younger brother, I don't feel as much obligation to push you two along in reading it, seeing as you haven't been away for too long and are probably still settling in.) Since the script reading isn't done, I haven't been able to start on my storyboard either. On the Bowstring front, little progress.

My side projects, for getting experience in various aspects in filming, are taking shape to a greater degree. The first is a parody idea off of a couple video game series, mixed with real life. Legend of Zelda and Super Mario Brothers. The general ideas is a couple kids getting items from those games in real life, and what they would do with them. I've written most of the script, and only have a few props to make, so I'll be working on that shortly.

I'm planning to use that as more of a practical project, working on understanding the script-to-screen process, picking and shooting with different camera angles and techniques, having actors use props on some level, and no techy-special effects. Just practical, real-life basics.

My second project idea involves more on the special effects side, and is bigger on the other side of filming styles. More action based. Wanting to do that one as more of a sci-fi-modern-day thing. I believe it'll be handy to have an understanding of various aspects in filming, and to know some of what I'm doing before trying to film a big movie. So while working on Bowstring, I'll be working on these too. Oh, and more news on the tech front, I got a mac-mini. Hooray for mac! It's much faster than my PC, so I'm trying to get better acquainted with the mac and it's functions. But that's where we're at. I'm going to keep working on the first side-project script. Hopefully more news (better news) soon!

-Icey
Mountains of Parchment

1st of September, 2011 - I'm back!

Sorry for the lack of updatefulness. I warned y'all I'd be away for most of august. The season's change has come, and we're finally out of winter and into spring. It is now September. I'll spare you any poetry about spring, as that'd be kind of pointless for a blog about making a movie... Now, I mentioned last time that I'd send the second draft out to my group of readers. None of whom have finished reading it yet. Hopefully soon. Some are part way through, and other's I haven't heard from in a while.

So in the meantime, I'm using my time in other areas of working on the movie. My plans for September include working on some costume stuff. Getting experience in filming and editing. (I've got a few mini film projects to get myself some experience before shooting the movie itself.) Casting. Writing the plan for the teaser trailer. Location scouting, and hopefully even storyboarding. Also want to make the MOP logo animation thing. Lots to do! Quite excited.

-Icey
Mountains of Parchment

5th of August, 2011 - BOOYEAH!

Wasn't that post title awesome? Yeah, admit it. It was. I'm excited. Finished the second draft of The Archer's Fable. It's 19 pages longer than the first draft, coming in for a total of 126 pages. I actually finished the second draft on the third, but wanted to do a script read through before I sent it out to my readers and posted here celebrating like a crazy person. Just finished the read through at 11:30 PM. I'm getting on an airplane tomorrow at mid day. Gotta get up early and pack... My alarm is set for 7 AM. Hopefully I won't forget anything! But YAY! Second draft is DONE! Just a quick post.

Oh, another mini-note on the story writing front of Bowstring... One of the characters has started writing a Journal. Heh-heh, yep. A few days back they told me they wanted to keep a journal, and I sitting, thinking to myself. "But I'm meant to be editing write now, not jotting down fictional years of a character's life from several years ago! Why is that relevant?" Turn's out it's not relevant for NOW in the script, as in TAF... But it'll be relevant later. And I can't say WHO'S journal is is, or any more than what I have already without spoiling it. But yeah, funny little thing that came up.

Readers (My Mum, Dannflow, FM, FM's younger brother, Tippie, Kitty and now, Gala. Welcome aboard.), check your inbox please. You should have a shiny email with a script attached to it. How exciting! I'm off to bed before hoping on the plane. (6th-17th, and the 24th-28th, I'll be away. Just a reminder.)

-Icey
Mountains of Parchment

28th of July, 2011 - Just a quick update

Sorry it's been a while. Editing, y'know. I've got 69 pages done, and the total page count thus far has increased to 119 pages. So it's pretty safe to assume that it'll get over 120 pages, I'd think... But yeah. To warn ahead of time, I don't know how much I'll be posting in August, as I'll be busy/away allot. I will be working on Bowstring while I can, you just won't get as many updates so frequently as previous months. Lots of Traveling in August. Just thought I'd say so you don't all think I've let the blog die or something like that. Hopefully post again before I'm off.

-Icey
Mountains of Parchment

19th of July, 2011 - More editing...

Went up north to my family's new holiday home. Pretty cool up there. I took my netbook computer so I could get some editing done. Act 2A is now in second draft! Hooray! That's 48 pages so far. Also while I was away I FINALLY started working on a locations list so that I know what I'll need... Locations for two Ranger assemblies (got one picked already.), four lots of fields, two forests (technically one forest, but two parts of it), four villages/towns- (good luck me), a cabin, stables, and an inn (good luck again me with finding things period-fitting.), then the castle gardens, courtyard and courtroom... some marshes (Though we know where we want to do that), a bridge (hopefully by some fields?) and then three locations I've vaguely marked as 'various', as their locations aren't so important... (I've found one I wanna use as 'various'.)

So I've got three locations sorta vaguely picked, and ideas for a few others, so it's a start. :) Maybe I'll post pictures sometime when I've got more location scouting done. That'd be a neat thing to do... Oh! So also, I've made a list for casting to keep track of who's acting who. Anddddd I've started a list of ideas for promotional stuff todo with teh movie for when it nears release. You can never have to many promotional ideas. They include things like Cosplay (Costume Play) stunts, vlogging things and some random funny misc-video stuff related to Bowstring. They make me grin just thinking of them, so hopefully they'll work well. But that's it for this update!

-Icey
Mountains of Parchment

16th of July, 2011 - Editing is my weak point

As mentioned before, editing really is my weak-point. I can read the script over and over for read throughs, but for some reason, I just have a hard time editing... It's quite frustrating. Music helps. Haven't been listening to enough music lately- or if I have, it hasn't had enough variety. I should do that more...

So, what I didn't mention in my last blogpost is another thing I was working on in regards to Bowstring, is working on a character design. I'm aware we have, like- no budget, so the film will be made on whatever people are willing to contribute, but I wanted to go ahead design this... I was working on Shadowleaf, and I decided to call my little session: "Planning Awesomeness". Pretty epic title for a planning session by yourself, eh? So I worked on things from colors and outfits, to weapons and practicality.

Generally different types of characters achieve "awesome" in different ways. The Sheriff of Nottingham (BBC's Robin Hood) was awesome because as a baddie. He really didn't have any issues with dispatching of random civilians, or hanging people/cutting out tongues; it was all fitting to his character. In fact, in his extremity and how he was portrayed as such so perfectly, added to his awesome factor. Don't get me wrong, hanging people and cutting out tongues is bad; don't do that, okay? But that's who the Sheriff is. He'd give the orders as this epic boss dude, and watch his guards do the dirty work- though occasionally doing some of said work himself -while he enjoyed his 'poetry of pain', ... I'm getting to into this, aren't I?

Moving on... Let's pick a good character for comparison this time, eh? Lemme think about that for a moment... Thinking... Thinking... Thinking... Let's stick with BBC Robin Hood, since that show is awesome. Marian. Hopefully without spoilers, she's awesome for her correctness. She's not a dumb damsel in distress, but she doesn't try too hard to be tough either. For a longggggggg time, she had the Sheriff and Guy fooled with her brilliantly tactical words, finding every loophole in a seemingly incriminating conversation. She'd leave just enough bait for Guy and the Sheriff to fall for some of hers ploys without landing in hot water. Now, sometimes her cleverness can be annoying too, but there's mostly a lot of win and genius with Marian. She is awesome; Robin's lucky to have a spy like her on his side. But enough Robin Hood now, even though it's awesome in general.

WARNING: Too much awesome can be lethal. If you are awesome, make sure you can control your awesomeness so you don't accidentally kill people with it. And don't nod at birds either, that's dangerous too. Back to Bowstring. Hopefully we'll have some "awesome" characters.

Updated the progress thingy. Up to 32 Pages! Hooray! I should really work on editing more... It's just getting into it that I have a hard time with. Once I do actually get going, I make a fair amount of progress. I got 11 pages done tonight... More than most other times. But I should call it a night. Hopefully get some more done tomorrow... Without procrastination. (No offense Pony-la, I do quite enjoy perusing ProcrastiNation, but it's very distracting when you're writing to work on a project.) Heehee.

-Icey
Mountains of Parchment

11th of July, 2011 - Second Draft

So here I am sitting with 21 pages of the second draft done. Editing has always been my weak point. I just seem to have a hard time concentrating. Before anyone says anything, I don't think it's writer's block; had that before and this is different. I'm just easily distracted. Hehe. But hey, I'm on scene 15 of 48. So that's 33 more scenes to go. Not too bad. Not exactly one fifth, but almost'ish. Through editing the page numbers keep on changing... Heh. Just thougth I'd let y'all know where I'm at.

6th of July, 2011 - The next phase!

I've had a week-long break now from Bowstring and haven't looked at the script in that time. It's time for the next phase; the second draft! Particularly this time going through, I'll be looking for the usual mistakes, and paying more attention to character actions so that people aren't just standing and talking. Not that they only stood and talked before- that'd be dumb. But it's tweaking and fine-tuning. I'll add another line to the Progress gadget thing saying where I'm at in the second draft. I love updating things like that. Hehe.

-Icey
Mountains of Parchment

29th of June, 2011 - Woo-who!

So yesturday- almost today -I mentioned that the first draft is properly done? Well now I've run the spell-checker over it and done that stuff too. No doubt there's still mistakes and typos from me accidentally adding typos to the dictionary. (Whoops.) I've sent the 107 pages out to my little group of readers.; Dannflow, Foley Man, Tippie, Kitty and my Mum. Hopefully they all like it. Heehee! I better get to work cooking that Shepard's pie for the potluck dinner, haahaa. I should do a script read-through tomorrow... After that, my plan is to finish watching Series 3 of Doctor Who, then get to work on the second draft.

-Icey
Mountains of Parchment

28th of June, 2011 - Really, The End

Haahaa- Sorry it's been a while again. I've re-written a couple scenes, and added a few more to properly finish the first draft. Hooray! 107 Pages! Smoothed over the character change-transition some, and added a more climatic-climax. It's nine minutes until midnight and I have Small-group tomorrow, so I should really be off to bed. Mmm, potluck dinner tomorrow night! Offtopic... Er, so my spellchecker turned off part way through writing this evening for some reason. I'll go over the spelling and do a final review and grammar checks and whatnot tomorrow before sending it out to my little group of readers. But thought I'd post, seeing as y'all deserve a post for waiting almost a week for me to post. Haahaa, I'm tired. Good night.

-Icey
Mountains of Parchment

23rd of June, 2011 - The End

You read the title right. The End. I've written the end. Well, not literally the words, "the end". I've written the end of The Archer's Fable! I'm not done working on writing it of course. The first draft marks one stage of writing, and I'm fully aware of a few changes and things I still need to add into the script. The climax needs to be more climatic I think. And something to do with a change in John's character needs to be a bit smoother. But yeah. End of the first draft! Woot!

Thinking yesterday on something important- casting. in The Archer's Fable, there are just shy of 30 characters with dialog. Now although nor all of these are main characters (I'd be concerned if I had 30 main characters) and some can be acted by the same actor, there's still going to be a lot of people I need to get come filming. Here's a little list of characters that talk...

John, Mendel, Iven, Galen, Shadowleaf, Edan, Reginald, Lilian, Aronele, Matthew, Edwin, Warrick, Andrew, Jeremy, Apprentice, Villager, Messenger, Woman, Guard1, Guard2, Guard3, Patron1, Patron2, Patron3, Random Noble, Random Patron, Court Member1, Court Member2, Court Member3...

And then I haven't listed groups of people. Those can be made up by some of the above anyway. But yeah, it'll be an interesting process. The only roles that we know for sure who's doing what are: John, Aronele, Shadowleaf and Lilian. Won't this be interesting? Haha.

-Icey
Mountains of Parchment

21st of June, 2011 - Early morning post

Whoooooooo! Late night writing buzz! Though most of you will say it's not late... It's ten to one in the morning. I watched 5 episodes of Lois & Clark: The new adventures of Superman today, that's three and a quarter hours of TV show. And I still got Piano practice done... What's more though, I got 15 pages written! I'll do a script read though tomorrow- er -later today, to check a few things before I announce what I want to tell y'all- but yeah... I might have some really exciting news next time. It's worthy of a whole post in itself.

-Icey
Mountains of Parchment

19th of June, 2011 - Writing again

Made another music track after my post on the 17th. Also now... So... I've got three more pages done... It's 11:180 PM. I'm really thinking now, where should I end The Archer's Fable? I know Veil of Trees mostly picks up a couple years later from the end of TAF. So before the end, John must spoilers spoilers spoilers, blah blah blah. Iven must spoilers spoilers spoilers, blah blah blah. And so that's as much as I know solidly about the ending of The Archer's Fable. Haha...... Sorry, that was very vague.

I'm TRYING to talk to Dannflow about what to do, but he keeps talking about clothes the 10th Doctor wore... so that's not really helpful. "Yum" was equally as helpful a while back. Oh well, it must be my lot in life to try and figure these things out on my own. Heh. I did remember another important thing that needs to happen before the second movie. Wow, I can't believe I'd forgot that for so long... I'd better add it to my notes so I don't forget.

-Icey
Mountains of Parchment

17th of June, 2011 - I'm going to be nice!

Hopefully I'm gonna get some writing done today. It doesn't help that I slept in until 10:50 AM today... Whoops. Now, as the title suggests, I'm going to be nice. However in doing so, I guess I'll have to admit I'm not going to be nice, too. I'm giving you a preview of The Archer's Fable; the first three scenes! This is not from the final draft, of course, since that's not done yet. I say this is partly not nice, because you only have three scenes, and not many more. But at least it's something. I feel like GLaDOS... Haha.

But here's another little treat... How about a music track?

This track is called "Galen", it's his theme and is used in multiple variations as the situation demands within the story; my general baddie theme. Shadowleaf's theme has some of Galen's theme in it. A good example of reoccurring themes, in my opinion, would be Star Wars.

-Icey
Mountains of Parchment

16th of June, 2011 - Typical me.

Sorry again for taking a while. Nothing new on the writing front, but I did another read-through today. Pages still at 79, but it took me an hour and 34 minutes to read out-loud. Read-throughs are quite handy for more than guesstimating time. It helps with checking how realistic the dialog is, how clear it is, and it also helps you to spot typos in the script or a better way to say something. Maybe I should try it with my blog posts sometime, haha. They also help if you haven't worked on your script for a few days and need to get back into the flow of the story. So yep, that's what I did today.

Added later: Updated the "What's Bowstring?" Page, just so y'all know.

-Icey
Mountains of Parchment

11th of June, 2011 - Sorry again!

Eh, it's been four days. I really did intend to write a post sooner... At least I'm doing it now. Been busy moving furniture stuff lots. So I'm at 79 pages now hooray! Kitty- a friend who's commented on here a few times, has written a copule funny parodies off the baddie, Galen. Good fun to read. Back on the script topic, John was spying, and Galen stabbed someone under the left arm again. How exciting.

Lots of people ask, WHY THE LEFT ARM? Well logically, the heart, obviously. However whenever I would mention Galen killing someone that way to my friends, they've heard it so much now, they say left armpit... "Oh, Icey's killing people by stabbing them under the left armpit again." Haahaa. YOu'd be amazed how much this joke actually comes up. It's scary. Heh-heh. But yep, I'm still here, still writing. Just been a few busy days is all.

-Icey
Mountains of Parchment