Alternative Mindz Blog

These are blogs from my Tribe Hollywood page about the project called 360. Enjoy!

Please forgive the structure of these posts – they were done in haste and are very crude!

2007.01.26

The worst thing as a director you can do to your cast and crew is make them work in 9 degree weather! Hey I’m out there too so all is fair in love and films. Filming the “mother scene” this weekend and we are editing stuff down, working on some sound effects for the flick and a style to the film. I don’t think I want it pure digital. We will see what the time frame is for this.

2007.01.21

It’s 2:32 in the morn’ on Jan 21 2007. We start filming at just about 6:30. We had to do some last minute things like getting camera stuff together and some props ready.

Props:
Props are a pain in the butt and when you don’t have a “prop” master you have to make due. I had to make blood and a fake floor so when we kill the one actress, the blood doesn’t stain the real floor. Also I had to make the cigarette box so that took a little time. I designed the package awhile ago but never got around to making it, but i got it done today.
Just worked on two tracks for the flick and have the group Halfway Crooks, giving the film a song. Check them out on myspace. It’s becoming a perfect project that we have not had in awhile.

Web stuff:
My web guys are very close to having the page updated soon. I hope it’s done before the new year! Haha; time will tell.
We cut the phone store scene together. Not bad, it’s about a little more than a minute. Working on some more shots this weekend and will start editing them as well.

2006.12.08

One of the hardest things when filming is the ability to control outside shots. At about 6:45 am Sunday Dec. 3, we shot a quick scene in which a Pontiac Firebird peels out and drives off. On our first take, we peel off and a police car drives by. Not having a permit sucks.

2006.12.07

Filming started 5:30 am Sunday. Shot car chase and “phone store” scene.

We shot this short film in October 2004. The script, like most, was written by me. The actors had no time to rehearse the scenes and we ran through each scene, from beginning to end chronologically and it came out great. Those two people who are in the film are SO easy to work with and they work cheap; cost me a dinner and a movie. Not bad, huh?

Well this is our first short that was seen by an audience, that is online. Anyway, it was entered into the Amazon.com Tribeca film festival online. It did well but we didn’t win, so, enjoy this film and the gag reel as well. It was a blast to make and I love working with these two actors; they should get all the credit. They worked for food. They are best kind of actors to work with. Thank you and enjoy.

This will be our epic story taking place from the seas of Japan to the shores of New York.

Over the next several months we will be showcasing famous Japanese myths, along with original short Manga (comic book) style online comics, as well as teaching Japanese for free!

Log on to AlternativeMindz.com to keep in touch with the land of the rising sun.

In August of 2003, we went out to film a short that I wrote called A Conversation with Death. It was to have starred William Patrick Liston and Jorge Marty. After writing the script and rehearsing it for weeks we set a day, the second Saturday in August. At that time, the Greenpoint Avenue train station was reverting trains to only run every half hour, which would allow over 20 minutes to film in what was supposed to be a 10 minute film. At the day of filming, Jorge dropped out and we had no replacement so I, the Director, stepped into the roll. (Ok, one thing I hate doing is acting in my own films. Cameos are cool but not being next to the lead.) Anyway, we get to the train station, we film the mugging scene, and everything is going good – well, until we went to the platform. It turned out that our friend, Mr. Murphy’s Law, showed up on set and was in full effect. The trains, instead of running every 30 minutes, ran every 5 minutes, the station was packed, and the police were all over the place. Yeah, we didn’t have permits, but we did pay for the Metrocard!

After 3 hours, we had less than 4 minutes of footage to use. We left determined to finish the flick in the next two weeks. Two weeks later we got back and right at the beginning, we were kicked out by the police. The footage was left untouched on minidv tape for awhile and we went on to other projects. When we had the chance, we went back and took what we had and made Bad Day. It’s an attempt to save what we had done and tried to make a short flick.

Summer 2007, we are going to make an online comic version of Bad Day: A Conversation with Death, with all the shots and angles we didn’t have. I hope you enjoy!