ARE YOU NUTS! NOT THE HOLLYWOOD SIGN!!!

So a bit off topic from my usual Bong Bloging today. I was working away the other day when I suddenly caught a few minutes of the “Elen DeGeneres show which was blaring behind me. She was ending her show with her concern in regards to how a real estate company has proposed to build houses in place of the Hollywood landmark sign! Of course I being someone who not only loves Hollywood, its sign and its heritage representation of everything movies, it immediately caught my attention. Once Elen explained how horrible this plan was and that WE need to stop it from happening she proceeded to let us know as the viewers that if WE want to stop this demonstration of true corporate greed, then WE need to donate money and help raise $900,000 in order stop it!

Now the last time I checked Elen was a multi millionaire as are ALL her friends such as Oprah, Dr. Phill not to mention every A-list actor in Hollywood!!! Why is it that they need money from regular folks such as you and I who are struggling to make a living as is? Yet when something as unthinkable as this is presented then WE are supposed to scrape together what little money we dont have in order to stop it from occurring? I was hoping she was going to end the show by saying dont worry about it, I paid the bill myself because I can god damn well afford it! Hell her and Oprah could flip the bill alone if they did not buy that next luxury unnecessary home decoration by one of their high end celebrity designers!

Im glad that she brought the attention to the word on her show but if she really gave a damn then she or each and every Hollywood actor in Hollywood should step up and take care of this instead of asking US to come up with the money! I just want to say shame on her and all those rich entertainment industry corporations and individuals. You think at least the studios in California could pool together and take care of this. Nine hundred thousand dollars is a drop in a bucket for a city where billions of dollars are generated annually!

If I had the money trust me that I would flip this bill in a heartbeat! I cant believe that even the rich and famous in Hollywood dont seem to give a damn about its heritage and importance!

Not so generous Elen De Generes!

The road to completion is a constant uphill grind

Its hard enough trying to do a film on your own in post with no crew but then throw in all the digital errors and glitches that come along every other day and its enough to want to hang yourself with your computer cord! I have had to endure so many silly glitches even though I spent $ 5000 on the latest and greatest Mac Pro Quad core in hopes of being able to breeze through my editing. The fact is no matter how much you spend you will always have to spend more! The computer does not like the codec, the video card does not like the filter, the Camera codec does not like the video card and on and on and on! For every problem you have to spend countless days without sleep trying to figure out why? why? why?!! I am a huge fan of MACs and have been for over 15 years but I must admit the new intel chips have taken them to a new low! I have never had so many crashes and stupid little glitches in my life. It sometimes feel like Im editing on a PC with the amount of problems I face on a daily basis.

NOW….all that BS aside I am still grinding and I refuse to be beat by a bunch of 0′s and 1′s! This film will get completed the way I want it to and on time! I just have to keep my sanity and hope I dont have a heart attack every time I turn on the mac. Im trying to get the film off to a submission for a film festival in the next couple of days and hope I can without any more trouble.

Big thank you to Video Copilot and Andrew Kramer!!

Its been over a year since I’ve been working on Bong OF The Dead grinding away and learning some new tricks as I push forward. One of the biggest challenges for my movie was not having the budget to get the exact shots I wanted with exact locations during the filming process. However knowing that I was limited in the real world was not at all discouraging given the proper tools for post production. I was guided to a great website called Video Copilot which was founded by one of the coolest and most original Digital video Production gurus known to man! Im talking about Andrew Kramer the man who has dedicated a web site to the art and technique of post digital effects. The web site is not only incredibly helpful for learning great FREE techniques for creating stunning visual effects, but also an incredible resource for independent Film makers such as myself who have the ideas but not the budget. I have learned so many incredible techniques from Andrew Kramer, that with out him this film would not be possible. The film itself cost me 15K but the look and feel I am able to create by using Andrew Kramers online tutorials has given it the big budget look I was going for. Here is a small sample of a scene in which the heroes are preparing for war against the hordes of zombies to come. I had initially hung a homemade green screen beside the cabin we were filming at in order to hide cars and the house in the background. By using the techniques I have learned from Andrew Kramer I was able to remove the background and place in a deep wooded forest in order to make them seem isolated.

Before shot with green screen in background.

Forest with no lighting.

Final composite with Tommy as he walks out of cabin in battle gear.