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