Tuesday, March 24, 2009

It has begun!

Jim Here,

Russ and I started Editing last night. I am proud to say that 5 minutes of Josh and Todd is cut and cropped! I know this doesnt sound like much, but to anyone whose made a film, they would know that this is indeed a time consuming process. It was indeed satisfying to do and nice to see some product up on the screen in more than just clips.

I will post more later.

JW

Monday, March 16, 2009

Friday - The Nitemare Shoot

So Friday night we shot the opening scene of Josh & Todd. In it Josh is having a nightmare. The completion of this shoot marked two big milestones in Josh & Todd:

1. It was the true conclusion of Principle Photography.

2. We reshot the scene that got me into Elmwood Productions all of those years ago.

Allow me a moment to explain...

However many years ago it was, 6 or 7 at this point, Jon, Russ, and I were employees at Borders Books & Music is Farmington, CT. We were all friends, but I hadn't really started hanging out with them outside of work too much yet. After a bunch of talk, Jon invited me over the his house to help in some filming for a goofy script that he had written, Josh & Todd: the Story of a Man & his Puppet. I liked the script and liked Jon and Russ, so I headed over after work.

Getting lost in Plainville (insert irony here: I live there now). I showed up at Jon's place around 10:30 pm on what I remember was a very hot summer evening. Jon and Russ were trying to get our Josh at the time, a gangly, funny kid we worked with named Josh Leder, to run down the alley on the side of Jon's house in a frightened fashion. Much to Jon's chagrin and Russ's continued frustration, it just wasn't coming together.

They wrapped for the evening, we all hung out a bit longer, and called it a night. A Couple of weeks later, they showed me a trailer for the film featuring the footage that they had shot throughout the day, including some from evening debacle that I witnessed.

I really enjoyed the trailer. The part that had struck and chord, and continues to today, was the opening scene of the trailer. Todd is walking down the streets of Plainville after being kicked out, and stops at a newspaper machine. His sticks his finger into the change return, hoping to find some, but to no avail. With a small shrug, he continues on his way. Something about that scene entertained me to no end and has stuck with me for all these years later.

That humid summer evening was my first night with Elmwood, although I didn't even know it yet...

- Jim

Thursday, March 5, 2009

Hey, Jim is actually posting!!!

Hey there all!

So, photography on J&T is finally nearing the end. We hope to have the last two scenes filmed this month. Russ has already loaded up the first set of shots and is patiently awaiting me to set up some time with him. It is still really my goal to see this sumbitch cut, cropped, and cleaned up by the end of June.

I kinda miss working on this film. It was such a huge undertaking and, while horribly stressful and at times completely disorganized, it was a ton of fun and extremely satisfying. Russ & Jon remind me that we have a lot of work left ahead of us on this, and that I will probably be sick of it by the time we're done (at least that's the conversation we had last time we really talked about it...) They're probably right, but for right now, it's still fresh in my mind as a delightfully stressful time in our lives.

So, that's it for now. I hope t be able to post something more substantial soon.

Till then,

Don't Dream it, Be it!

Jim