Soul Searcher: December 12th 2003 (later on)

Posted on Shooting People today for composers. My inbox this evening contained several mails along the lines of: “A full orchestral score for no money – you can’t be serious!” Oh but I am, sir. I hate sample-based scores almost as much as I hate CG. You know when you’re listening to one and you’re almost convinced, but then some strings or a trumpet of some form comes in and in that two seconds you know you’re watching a low budget film that some guy’s scored in his bedroom with a Casio? I’d rather have a score played by a school orchestra, recorded in their gym with one microphone. I guess that makes me a fool in most people’s eyes. Well so be it.

I still haven’t got round to watching Flight of the Navigator. What’s up with that?

Thanks to Ray for his “comedy” tag lines. You’re fired.

Soul Searcher: December 12th 2003 (later on)

Soul Searcher: December 10th 2003

I finished the rough cut a couple of hours ago. It clocks in at around 107 minutes, which is more than I expected, especially given that we have a good 15 minutes still to shoot. It’s great because it means I can cut it really tight if I want without having to worry about it getting too short to be marketable.

Mya’s started work on some concept art for the special effects. We’re now officially on the look-out for matte painters, model makers, puppeteers, stop motion animators, cell animators, CG artists and visual effects DOPs. Woah, that was weird. As I wrote “puppeteers” I looked over at a photo of Ray and suddenly imagined he was a puppet. Woah, now Kermit the Frog’s popped into my head. Er, better quash this thought train quick…

The big question now is do I (a) start laying temp music, (b) finish the trailer, (c) watch Flight of the Navigator or (d) go to bed. I think a bit of (b), followed by (a) and then a big dollop of (d). Tomorrow I plan to see some real people.

Soul Searcher: December 10th 2003

Soul Searcher: December 9th 2003

I just bought Flight of the Navigator on DVD. How good is that? “David Freeman is eight years late for dinner and his family want to know why. But David’s got an absolutely fantastic excuse…”

I sent my camera off for repair AGAIN, this time to Canon UK’s headquarters in Elstree. Presumably there to be looked at by Finnesbury Park, their chief scientist. Let’s hope they can ACTUALLY FIX IT this time, rather than just keeping it for a few weeks and then sending it back unchanged. Worringly, whatever’s screwing my poor XL1-S over seems to be contagious, since my deck is now complaining of head clogs. I’m duplicating the rushes as we speak, just in case it turns out to be some sinister nano-virus intent on destroying Soul Searcher forever.

My bank statements are becoming interesting reading. We still haven’t been invoiced for any of the locations we used, so it’ll be fun when those come through.

Oh dear. I’ve just noticed that on the Navigator cover art one of the aliens appears to be… well, if you’ve got a copy of it, check out the kid’s facial expression and you’ll get the picture.

Watching the rushes from the first weeks of production is like stepping into some weird parallel dimension. All that stuff in High Town, and with the Companions of the Crew (sic) seems like years ago.

Anyway, I finished capturing the footage late Sunday night and started editing. Last night I edited until 6am, reaching scene 25. I also cut most of the teaser.

Soul Searcher: December 9th 2003

Soul Searcher: December 7th 2003

Somehow I’ve slipped back into a nocturnal cycle, getting up at 3pm, working until 4 or 5am then going to bed. I’m beginning to wonder if I’ll ever see daylight again. At the moment I’m still capturing the footage into the computer. At the time of writing I’ve got four tapes left to go, so I should be done tonight and ready to start editing tomorrow.

I’ve recently been getting paranoid about my flat burning down and the film in its entirety being destroyed. As soon as I’m done capturing I’m going to start duping the tapes and then take them to my parents’ house for safe keeping.

Coming soon: new and improved website, with teaser trailer and much, much more. As they say.

Soul Searcher: December 7th 2003

Soul Searcher: December 2nd 2003

Slept for 14 hours. Started clearing up the flat – a mammoth task. Met up with James to sort out the budget. Once all the expenses cheques have cleared my Soul Searcher account will be just shy of its overdraft limit. I have no idea how we’re going to pay for the January part of the shoot. That’s not something James will have to worry about though, as his role as producer is now most definitely at an end. He was aware that he was not up to the job and in fact had considered pulling out before the shoot but couldn’t bring himself to let me down. Fair enough, since if he’d done that the shoot would never have happened.

Still, that’s all in the past now. “You mean the future.”

Did I mention that on Sunday night I couldn’t sleep so I got up and started writing the sequels? No? Well, I have now. I didn’t get very far. Some dodgy 70s movie called The Beast Must Die was on TV and I kinda found myself watching it. Curse you, Peter Cushing.

Soul Searcher: December 2nd 2003

Soul Searcher: December 1st 2003

My alarm went off at 7:35am and my immediate reaction was: “It won’t be dark enough to shoot for hours yet… must go back to sleep…” Then I remembered the shoot was over. I sleep-walked through the morning’s work, struggling to keep my eyes open, and was extremely grateful when it turned out to be a short day and I could bugger off home just after 1pm. I went to bed for three hours.

It’s pretty odd not shooting any more. We didn’t shoot yesterday, incidentally, partly because Chris Hatherall’s car broke down but mainly because of heavy rain. We sat in Rowden Mill Station for a couple of hours eating mini-muffins and stoking the fire before giving up and going home. A fitting end to the shoot, really. How fecking depressing.

Right, got to start editing. Bye.

Soul Searcher: December 1st 2003