Sunday, September 24, 2006

More Editing: An Update

Worked some more on Thrash Bus II last night, and am working on it this morning. Finished the Closing Credits last night, and have now embarked upon the final leg of this monumental journey I am undertaking. The sound editing.

It's interesting as to what makes a good movie work so well, is that its not always the picture on display. Often, the sound and sound effects play an enormous role in what you feel for whats happening on screen. From the thunderous sounds of battle to the more egrarious atmospheric tones of a family home, the sound puts you in the moment. Problem is, sometimes you have to find a sound that suits the environment thats not always actually found in that environment. Thats where you have to fake it. At the moment, I am editing the fight sequences sound effects, and trying to find a sound that approximates two sticks hitting each other, with a lot more punchy subtext than the actual recorded sound. At the moment, the audio is quite tinny and high frequency. By adding a little more bass and middle range to the sound, the act of hitting somebody or stiking a weapon is more impactful.


And this process can take a while. Each effects sound has to be scrutinized, adjusted for pitch and tone, manipulated for frequency range and spatial accuracy, and then put into the main mix so its neither overpowering nor indiscernible. Its quite an art. One I am trying very hard to learn, very very quickly.

Have a great day.

Saturday, September 23, 2006

Crows Flag Hopes Are Dashed

Well, today was a sad day for the Adelaide football club. The Crows lost their second preliminary final against the West Coast Eagles, in a repeat of the same game in 2005, ending their premiership campaign and allowing the Eagles to move on to play Sydney for the second straight Grand Final.

Lisa and I were screaming at the telly, along with the 54000 fans at Amii Stadium, but it was to no avail. A disappointing lapse of concentration in the third quarter saw the Eagles overcome a twenty five point deficit in a low scoring affair, to overtake the Crows during the last quarter.

Colour me dissapointed, and now all that is left to do is lament a year of squandered opportunity, and eagerly await the 2007 season.

On a lighter note, tonight I finished the closing credits to Thrash Bus II. All thats left is the sound editing, and she's in the can baby!!!! yeah!!!!!

Friday, September 22, 2006

V For Vendetta And The Preliminary Finals

I don't have much to say at the moment.

Watched V For Vendetta last night. Excellent film. Wonderfully shot by the late Adrain Biddle, directed and acted. Special effects were plentiful but not overly obvious. Wonderful stuff.

Fremantle lost to Sydney in tonights First AFL Preliminary Final, played at the Telstra Stadium in Sydney. I kninda knew Sydney would win, but in my heart I wanted Fremantle to prevail just so they could play next week in the Grand Final. That said, Adelaide and West Coast play tomorrow in the second Prelim. I will no doubt be screaming at the telly from about 3pm tomorrow. Dont come close to me if Adelaide lose.

GO CROWS!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Tuesday, September 19, 2006

Pirate Tuesday

Arrrggggghhhhhhh, I just wanted to add another pirate-y thought.

Why did the Daddy pirate not let his kid watch the movie?

Because it was rated ARrrrrrrrrrgggghhhhhhhhhhhhh!

h ehe he

it's a classic.

Arrgggghhhh

Yep, its "World Talk Like A Pirate" day today.

Everybody grab your wooden leg, eyepatch and shoulder-parrot and get about walking the plank.
Might have to watch Pirates of the Carribbean again tonight......

Arrrghhh, me hearties!

Monday, September 18, 2006

The Editing Process - Thrash Bus II Comes Together.

A few years ago, I made a little short film entitled "The Editing Process" whislt my brother was off getting footage for his film "Hello Annabel". The short, 60 second piece involved Box trying to edit a piece of footage while others stood about him and told him what to do, something he in real life found quite annoying. While the point of "The Editing Process" was humour, and the underlying theme of too-many-cooks rang true for all involved, there was something that that short film never accomplished: to let the viewer understand how much pain and sufferring any filmmaker goes through while trying to edit their masterpice.

In the olden days, back when computers were merely used to calculate Holocaust victims and programme simple arithmetic problems, film was edited on film, cutting and taping the film together in the back room at the studio while the executives breathed down your neck about how much time there was left until release. It was a hard, painstaking process because if you wanted alternate takes, different angles, or to make the scene slightly shorter/longer, much effort was involved.
These days, the power of the silicon chip has come the rescue of many a harried filmmaker. And many a harried editor is probably rueing the day filme went digital.

These days, digital technology has opened up the filmmaking business with a freedom and cost-effectiveness never before seen on screen. Scenes can be edited quickly, with minimal fuss, so a director can see what he has, and what he still needs, before moving on to the next scene. Of course, when you are working on a big budget feature, with camera everywhere, the volume of footage able to be captured and processed quickly is exponentially larger than you'd expect. Therefore, editors have much more material to trawl through to find what they need.

Having just finished the editing process of Thrash Bus II, and now commencing to move into the post production sound editing and music scoring stage, I have come to understand the importance of planning and brevity. Having almost 30 hours of footage filmed to work through, trying to bring the film to a manageable and enjoyable length, I have to admit to being some kind of sadist. I truly did bring this upon myself. While in more recent times I have learned to film exactly what is required and nothing more, earlier efforts at filming were haphazard to say the least.

Case in point: this weekend I completed the final production on the opening credits, utilising footage gleaned from each of those 30 hous worth of digital tapes. Thats a lot of footage to go through, just to find bits that are not in the final product, that are worthy of being included on screen with the final product, and that are not boring. Hopefully, I have succeeded.

Editing: its a painful thing.

More on the Making of Thrash Bus in a later post.

Thursday, September 14, 2006

The End is In Sight

Well, the hard slog is almost over. After years of toil, torture and labour, Thrash Bus II: Clone Of The Thrash Bus, is completed in the editing stage. That right, the films final edit is done. All that is left is to dub the film, add in the sound effects, and correct the music cues one last time. But the EDIT is done. I have a finished length of film.... with the exception of the closing credits. But they will go last once everything else is done.
You know, that light over there looks remarkably like what life was like before I commenced work on this film.......

Tuesday, September 12, 2006

The First Anniversary

Hi all,

Well, we did it! Lisa and I just celebrated 1 year of wedded bliss! Happy happy joy joy. Now you may ask what did I do for my lovely wife on the weekend of celebration... fair question. Well, I booked us into the Rendesvous Allegra Hotel in Waymouth Street, and we bunked there for Saturday afternoon, before a casual jaunty walk to the pancake kitchen for lunch, then back to the hotel to watch the Crows defeat Fremantle in the footy. Then, we skedaddled off to the best restaurant I have ever eaten at, The Lenzerheide (in Belair) and stuffed ourselves full of the most exquisite quisine I have ever had. Then, back to the hotel for the night.
We awoke to the sound of nothing at all, arose and went to the hotels dining area for a gorgeous (but expensive) buffet breakfast, after which we checked out, moseyed down to Cape Jervois and then to Victor Harbor.

All this took a lot out of the both of us, so we went home and crashed late in the afternoon. All in all, a wonderfully decadent and relaxing way to celebrate a year of marriage.

Have a good day all!

Friday, September 08, 2006

King Of the Mountain

And now Brocky drops off the perch. What a dreadful week in Australian culture: two of our national icons, heroes to millions, die within days of each other.
Peter Brocks influence on Motorsport, whilst diminished in recent years since his retirement from professional racing, was enormous. His stature as a racing driver has been placed among other luminares as Ayrton Senna, Jack Brabham and Michael Schumacher.
I had the opportunity to meet Brocky through my association with Bridgestone, and although I didn't get to know him well, he seemed really down to earth, somebody who never took his iconic status for granted, nor ever lorded it over everyone. He was always friendy, always willing to chat with fans, and tried to make time for everybody he could. Often known as Peter Perfect, his racing record will perhaps never be equalled in modern proffessional competition.
With the nation in mourning already for Steve Irwin, the tragedy of this event will no doubt continue the horror week for our cultural identity.
Vale, Peter Brock, King of The Mountain.

Thursday, September 07, 2006

If I Could....

Just finished watching the post production diaries of peter Jacksons King Kong 2 disc set. I had a thought. If I could never direct a film, and only have a behind the scenes role, my two choices would be either:

1) Sound mixer/designer

2) Foley artist.

The Foley Artist gets to have a bunch of fun making the sounds for the film. That would be cool.

Anyway, thats just my 2 cents.

Night.

Crikey.

Well, amongst the thousands of blog entries, the posts on websites dedicated to the Mr Crikey, the volumes of data traffic across the internet spiking to near-record levels since 9/11, the flood of sympathy and sadness at the loss of Steve Irwin continues this week. It will continue until Mr Irwin is laid to rest at the funeral which will undoubtably stop the nation (even if his family has decided against a State Funeral). The outpouring of grief across the world has appeard to suprise many, including (by all reports) his family, although I am somewhat puzzled by this statement. Mr Irwin was a larger than life guy, a great Aussie bloke who we cringed at when on US chat shows and the like, "crikey"-ing about the world with a passion so big his body simply couldn't contain it. A large portion of this country, and indeed the known world, never knew Mr Irwin personally. But we feel his loss. Why do we mourn for a man we have never met? Is it some kind of emotional response given that he entered our lounge rooms regularly vie the TV screen? A large portion of this country thought Mr Irwin was a madman. An idiot. Just check out the message boards of most newspaper internet sites if you don't believe me. For everybody claiming he was a great man, there's somebody ready to stick it to him now he's gone. I don't feel like debating the methods he used in his shows, either on TV or in his Australia Zoo park. Dangling his kid in front of a crocdile is hardly a sane thing, but then, Mr Irwin knew the risks. For anybody declaring opinions about the man after he is dead, and now unable to defend himself, its a pretty low act. I never met him personally, but somehow, I felt I knew him well. As, I am sure, are these feelings echoed around the world, such was Irwin's personality.
Much bandwidth and ink has been used since last monday, when the news broke just after 12pm here in Adelaide, although it was fifteen minutes earlier in QLD (I know, I was one the phone to somebody in QLD when the news came thru and listened to their radio report) and all the gushing praise and overwhelming sympahy is starting to get just a little trite, so I'll keep my bit short and sweet.

Steve Irwin was, undoubtably, larger than life. He lived his life, and the life of his family, as big and loud as he could. Australia never quite understood him and his mad fascination for every single dangerous animal on the planet, but we understood what he meant for this country in terms of tourism, and local economy. Americans loved him. England loved him. Heck, the rest of the world capable of understanding him loved him. And now that he's dead, Australia "loved" him. I never knew him, but I did admire him. he brough animals to the world in a new way, and although he didn't go out wrestling a crocodile, like I had assumed he would, he did die doing what he loved most. Not many of us get to go out that way. Rest in peace Steve. Hope there's crocs up there in heaven mate.