State of the Union Address

Hello Everybody! (Thom..maybe Josh..Bailey?)

I started this blog months ago and just as I predicted, it sat, untouched, for a very long time. I can't promise that won't happen again once this post is complete, but I wanted to show some sign of life.

As anybody who knows me knows, I like to line up about 5 film projects at a time in my head, tell everyone about them, write a few script pages, and move on to 5 new ideas. Other than my 48 hour films or class projects, I rarely see anything through to completion. So at THIS VERY MOMENT, I'm going to list every project I've recently mentioned to anybody, followed by the current status of that project. Let's begin.

UNTITLED SPACE BABY SEQUEL
Status: Not happening...ever.
There was a very brief amount of time that this was very close to happening. I was actually writing it as a 2 parter to be shot back to back, creating a Space Baby trilogy. My motivation was that I've always been fascinated with sequels and really really wanted to make one. Once I got over that, I realized that more Space Baby is a horrible idea. In fact, ANY Space Baby in the first place was a horrible idea.

UNTITLED FEATURE LENGTH FILM
Status: Not happening anytime soon
I guess you could say I'm still writing this. It's definitely on hold. It's a story about a strange guy(loosely based on my brother) and his friend. Daniel threw the idea at me at least a year ago and I've been writing it as my first feature on and off since then. As of now, if I ever get around to shooting an independent feature, I still want this to be it. I think what I've written so far is the best stuff I've ever written. I'll probably hold off on this one until I've finished film school(or sooner if I don't go.) I feel like the story really lends itself to the whole "no budget/tiny crew" style.

SAVE THE GHOSTBUSTERS
Status: In Preproduction
Yes, it's looking like this, the most unrealistic of all my potential projects, is actually happening. I'm very close to having a draft of the script done. If everything goes according to plan, we'll be shooting this summer after the 48 Hour Film Project blows over. As nerdy as it may be, I've always wanted to make a fan film, and I see no better time to do it than now. This is a HUGE year for Ghostbusters. Not only is it the 25th anniversary, but the bluray, videogame, and new action figures are all being released. There's also more talk than ever about a 3rd movie starting production as soon as this fall. Ghostbusters has been my favorite film since I could barely talk. I think of this as my tribute to the film that made me want to make films. Now I just need to figure out how the hell I'm gonna be able to afford a proton pack.

UNTITLED 2009 48 HOUR FILM
Status: Definitely Happening
June 5th, 6th, and 7th! We won best film in St. Louis last year. I can't wait to see what happens this year. The films I'm proudest of are the 48 hour films we've made, so I'm really looking forward to this.

UNTITLED iRIFF
Status: Unknown, but very possible
This is something CJ and I talked about briefly. There's a site called Rifftrax.com which is run by some of the Mystery Science Theater 3000 guys. They provide humorous commentaries for all kinds of movies they couldn't do on MST3k(Roadhouse, Star Wars, Glitter, etc.) Anyway, there's a section on the site called iRiffs where fans can submit their own commentaries to any film they want. You can submit just the audio, or if the film is in the public domain, you can include the video. You set a price for it and get 50% of the earnings each quarter that it makes over $25. Our idea was to do ours as a fully produced show, much like MST3k, using green screen to sillouette ourselves in front of the movie and everything. We never decided on a movie, but I really wanna do this Italian Road-Warrior ripoff called Warriors of the Wasteland. I'm still really interested in doing this, but CJ and I havent talked about it lately because we rarely see each other. I really hope we do it eventually, and I really hope it's even remotely funny.


That's everything, I think. Not as bad as I thought..haha. I should get back to work now. I just realized there are like 20 customers in here. BYE!

A Glimpse of Nonsense

I'll start with the obvious. My name is Dylan and I'm an amateur filmmaker. I guess you could call me a film student, though I'm kind of "between schools" at the moment. I've started this blog for a few reasons, which I'll share with you shortly. But first, I'll answer the two questions that I know you're DYING to hear the answers to.

1) What does axis of action mean?
It's a filmmaking term. It's basically an imaginary line that you never cross with the camera unless you want your movie to look like shit. See the 180 degree rule for details.

2) Why is that the name of your blog?
Because it sounds cool! And it's not generic like "Caffeine Tambourine Blog" would have been.

Now that we got that out of the way, I'll get back to why I've started this blog and what I plan to do with it. I started this blog because I've never had a blog before. I had a livejournal once, but that doesn't count because the word "blog" didn't exist yet. Plus, blogs often follow some kind of theme, while journals are just an excuse to complain about your boring, miserable life.

In the future, and by future I mean like..later tonight, this will be the place to come for updates on whatever film projects I may be working on. I also hope to do fun stuff like write movie reviews. Sure, I'm not a professional critic and my opinion doesn't matter...but I have a blog now, so I'm allowed to do pretentious things like critiquing movies that i could never make myself.

Lastly, I'd like to incorporate video in some way...whether it be video production blogs, trailers for upcoming projects, or video reviews.

Basically, I have no solid plan for this thing, and it will probably end up being pages and pages of utter nonsense.

Stay tuned for nonsense!

-Dylan