DRY BONES Day 21 - The Wrap
Day 21 of Dry Bones was scheduled for two shots only: a close up of Kathy Murphy delivering one line to John Renna, and the big special effect when she reduces him to...but that would be telling. We were supposed to grab these shots last weekend, but my key effects artists Arick Szymecki and Rod Durick were working around the clock between their regular jobs and this assignment, and I didn't want them dropping dead, so I pushed the shots back one week. As it turns out, we needed to re-shoot some of the shots from the last shoot anyway, so I'm glad I made that call...even though they still ended up working around the clock before this last shoot.
The Big Effect involved a full head bust of John Renna, my pal who plays brokenhearted cop Carl Denham. Throughout the film, we see the husks of the victims of Lilim, our succubus (played by Debbie Rochon). For Carl's demise, we wanted to show exactly what happens during this process - in other words, it's a "money shot" (both figuratively and literally). When Michael O'Hear (star, co-producer, co-director) and I met with Rod and Arick to discuss the effects for this project, we agreed to pull out the stops for this effect. I don't know how many man hours went into the creation of this gag, which will probably last all of three seconds in the finished film, but it was labor intensive to say the least. I visited them several times in the lab late at night, and Stacey Book contributed to the effect by adding the Renna mustache, soul patch and eyebrows.I've posted a zillion photos of Renna's head, along with some funny/nasty pics of my wife Tamar wearing the venereal diseased succubus breasts, on Facebook: http://www.cartoonbrew.com/disney/breaking-disney-just-gutted-their-hand-drawn-animation-division-81043.html
Set call was 5 pm, and I'd scheduled the wrap for 10 pm. It was fun to see everyone's reactions to the Renna head; they'd followed its progress,but there is something about incomplete effects heads which make sit impossible to believe they will ever look like the actual person they're modeled on...even when the actor's head was cast in the first place. Then we dressed him/it in his police costume. Kathy delivered her line, then engaged the head in the effect, which involved a shop vac. The effect worked flawlessly. We did three takes, moved in closer, did three more takes, then shot two close-ups of its painted eyes doing their thing. I'd been looking forward to shooting this sucker for weeks, and the guys worked so hard on it, and it was over in minutes. Movie magic, baby!
With Kathy and Michael wrapped (Michael is seen in the b.g. of the big effect), we moved on to our second unit agenda. First we shot Tamar - wearing one succubus hand glove - closing a bedroom door for our opening scene. It looked great, so I'm glad we did it. Then we re-shot angles of our borrowed lava lamp, incorporating a new idea from me and a week old one from Sam Qualiana, our DP. Again, they looked great, and I'm glad we re-did them. That's a wrap on the lava lamp!
Because John Renna was two hours late - something about a friend passing out on his living room floor - Rod gracious grilled hotdogs for everyone. Fortunately John showed up in time to eat, and to pose for a series of increasingly obscene pics with his latex alter ego. John was helpful on several days in addition to his acting, and I'm glad he made it for our last day.
Next we re-shot a bit with Tamar wearing the succubus breasts again. The shot worked great last week, but we forgot part of the costume, so it wouldn't have matched the other shots in the same scene, The breasts looked as good as hairy succubus breasts can, and we wrapped Tamar. We had to wait for the sky to get dark for our last two shots, establishing shots of my house. Chris Rados lit the house from within and outside, Sam practiced the dolly moves, and we wrapped the film and everyone was on their way by 10:00 pm. It was a fun, pressure-free day (like most of them on this show), especially for Kaelin, who loved having so many creative people around.
I've looked over the new footage, and I'm satisfied we're really done. Phil Gallo will start editing any day (he's transcoding the footage now), Arick is doing a couple of visual effects shots, David McCreery is doing our score, and someone will help me do sound effects. The entire film will be done in August, we hope to screen it at several festivals, and we're planning a one week theatrical run in Buffalo in October. We came in on budget and on time.
I try to learn something new with every film experience, and here's what I took away from this one:
It is only necessary to say "Cut" once; "Cut! Cut! Cut!" will put people on edge.
Never assume people will return emails in a timely manner. Some will, others need to be hounded.
Never shoot without a monitor.
Next, Sam Qualiana and I are moving on to The Legend of Six Fingers, featuring Debbie Rochon, Lynn Lowry and Tiffany Shepis. Michael Raso is providing matching funds for every donation made to our IndieGoGo campaign: http://www.indiegogo.com/projects/the-legend-of-six-fingers/x/78828
The Big Effect involved a full head bust of John Renna, my pal who plays brokenhearted cop Carl Denham. Throughout the film, we see the husks of the victims of Lilim, our succubus (played by Debbie Rochon). For Carl's demise, we wanted to show exactly what happens during this process - in other words, it's a "money shot" (both figuratively and literally). When Michael O'Hear (star, co-producer, co-director) and I met with Rod and Arick to discuss the effects for this project, we agreed to pull out the stops for this effect. I don't know how many man hours went into the creation of this gag, which will probably last all of three seconds in the finished film, but it was labor intensive to say the least. I visited them several times in the lab late at night, and Stacey Book contributed to the effect by adding the Renna mustache, soul patch and eyebrows.I've posted a zillion photos of Renna's head, along with some funny/nasty pics of my wife Tamar wearing the venereal diseased succubus breasts, on Facebook: http://www.cartoonbrew.com/disney/breaking-disney-just-gutted-their-hand-drawn-animation-division-81043.html
Set call was 5 pm, and I'd scheduled the wrap for 10 pm. It was fun to see everyone's reactions to the Renna head; they'd followed its progress,but there is something about incomplete effects heads which make sit impossible to believe they will ever look like the actual person they're modeled on...even when the actor's head was cast in the first place. Then we dressed him/it in his police costume. Kathy delivered her line, then engaged the head in the effect, which involved a shop vac. The effect worked flawlessly. We did three takes, moved in closer, did three more takes, then shot two close-ups of its painted eyes doing their thing. I'd been looking forward to shooting this sucker for weeks, and the guys worked so hard on it, and it was over in minutes. Movie magic, baby!
With Kathy and Michael wrapped (Michael is seen in the b.g. of the big effect), we moved on to our second unit agenda. First we shot Tamar - wearing one succubus hand glove - closing a bedroom door for our opening scene. It looked great, so I'm glad we did it. Then we re-shot angles of our borrowed lava lamp, incorporating a new idea from me and a week old one from Sam Qualiana, our DP. Again, they looked great, and I'm glad we re-did them. That's a wrap on the lava lamp!
Because John Renna was two hours late - something about a friend passing out on his living room floor - Rod gracious grilled hotdogs for everyone. Fortunately John showed up in time to eat, and to pose for a series of increasingly obscene pics with his latex alter ego. John was helpful on several days in addition to his acting, and I'm glad he made it for our last day.
Next we re-shot a bit with Tamar wearing the succubus breasts again. The shot worked great last week, but we forgot part of the costume, so it wouldn't have matched the other shots in the same scene, The breasts looked as good as hairy succubus breasts can, and we wrapped Tamar. We had to wait for the sky to get dark for our last two shots, establishing shots of my house. Chris Rados lit the house from within and outside, Sam practiced the dolly moves, and we wrapped the film and everyone was on their way by 10:00 pm. It was a fun, pressure-free day (like most of them on this show), especially for Kaelin, who loved having so many creative people around.
I've looked over the new footage, and I'm satisfied we're really done. Phil Gallo will start editing any day (he's transcoding the footage now), Arick is doing a couple of visual effects shots, David McCreery is doing our score, and someone will help me do sound effects. The entire film will be done in August, we hope to screen it at several festivals, and we're planning a one week theatrical run in Buffalo in October. We came in on budget and on time.
I try to learn something new with every film experience, and here's what I took away from this one:
It is only necessary to say "Cut" once; "Cut! Cut! Cut!" will put people on edge.
Never assume people will return emails in a timely manner. Some will, others need to be hounded.
Never shoot without a monitor.
Next, Sam Qualiana and I are moving on to The Legend of Six Fingers, featuring Debbie Rochon, Lynn Lowry and Tiffany Shepis. Michael Raso is providing matching funds for every donation made to our IndieGoGo campaign: http://www.indiegogo.com/projects/the-legend-of-six-fingers/x/78828
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