Post-production is going very well.  VFX looking amazing as ever, and while our audio team has had a few speed bumps, things are looking good. We also have a new graphic designer who is currently working on our final poster for the film.

This is a post-production update.

ADR has finally started up again.  And I now have nightly emails from Ryan for VFX.  The visuals are just looking so amazing.  And I am happily (hopefully) returning to Athens for a few weeks by this coming weekend.  Just about every day now I'm making a call, sending an email, or looking over visuals for the film.  It's really exciting to see it all finally coming together.  And soon, I'll be sifting through some music samples.

Cheers!
--Stephonika W. Kaye
  Director / Writer

Our first round of ADR is nearly at an end.  By 3pm today Juliette Rocheleau will have completed her ADR.  There will likely be an additional session later for other sounds, but after today, we hang up ADR for about two weeks until we get back at it.

We began ADR (additional dialogue replacement/recording) on the 25th of this month with Razzante, and our first day went off quite well.  Yesterday, we took a day off, and now today we will be getting together with Duncan Shaw to do more of the same.

None of the actors have really seen any of the film yet, so it's always fun to watch their reactions as they watch themselves in preparation for the recording process.

In other news, VFX is coming along slowly but very well.  Color correction is going good as well.

We also have a professor that is going to get us into a rather nice room for our premiere night in November for free!  We're very excited for that.

All in all TNC has had a great summer!

Cheers,
--Stephonika W. Kaye
  Director/Writer

I have achieved picture-lock.  Due to some delays, this baby ships out tomorrow (one day later than expected).

And here we go!

Cheers,
--Stephonika W. Kaye
  Director / Writer

Well, I am currently exporting a complete near-picture-locked film at the moment for a test screening I am holding with about 7 or 10 others in a few hours.  This is an exciting few days, and hopefully if all goes well, I'll be getting great feedback, and not have too much to do to it over the next two ensuing days, cuz the Eridanus ships out to get her VFX on Monday!!

Also, audio is gearing up for its full run at post-pro, which is so exciting, cuz that means I'll get to see all the actors again at some point before the premiere in November!

Cheers,
--Stephonika W. Kaye
  Director / Writer

After gathering outsider opinions from two professors and a fellow young colleague, Dan Wainio, I am satisfied that my work on the ROUGH CUT of TNC thus far is going very well.  They all give great, great feedback, but ultimately the final decisions must be up to me.  I never thought decisions like these would be sooo difficult.  I've definitely learned that editing is just the same as writing: sometimes you have to cut what you love to make your baby even greater.


Also after having discussed the situation of my desired professional name, I will be "changing" my name as it were starting with this project.  So, on November 5th 2011, I will make my first official public bow as Stephonika W. Kaye.

Cheers,
--Stephonika W. Kaye
  Director / Writer

Back on Thursday June 2nd, TNC wrapped filming and it was an exciting day.  Now, however, all that hard work continues as we have gone full force into post-work.  As we did not have a full time editor signed on, I took on the challenge to edit the film myself.  And so....

We finally have a complete ROUGH CUT of the film!  I actually viewed the entire rough cut for the first time from beginning to end yesterday with a fellow filmmaking friend of mine.  And it's actually looking pretty good so far.  Quite a bit of work still to do, but there are already quite a few scenes in picture-lock.

Cheers,
--Stephanie Kaye Branham
  Director / Writer

So, it has been quite a while since I last posted an update in this blog, but it totally went crazy for us about a month ago.  So, here's the rundown of what happened and where we're at now:

Our lead actor had an accident (off-set) and has had his jaw wired shut for the past 6 weeks.  Therefore, we tried getting an extension on our warehouse with no luck.  In the end we had to film a fight scene with him without him being able to speak and with limited facial gestures.  We pulled it off, though.  And now for the speaking parts that he DID have and we weren't able to shoot, we framed him up and then had him step out so that we shot only the background images.  Later this month, we are resetting the lighting and putting him in front of a greenscreen and we will be compositing the two clips together to give the effect that Foor actually filmed on the set.

In other news, we only have 5 scenes left to shoot which we are gearing up for starting the second weekend of May.  We will officially be wrapped with principle photography after the third weekend is through!

Now, we are preparing for Guerrsfest, a local film festival, into which we plan to enter a substantial amount of footage from TNC.  We are working on our post work already, with VFX and audio recordings, and our deadline for picture-lock is set, with a handful of scenes already locked in.  These scenes will be the first to have post effects added, and are actually being transferred to my supervisor, Nord, right this minute!

Lastly, we have been invited to present a rundown of how we made and are making TNC to the 419 class here (Advanced Video Project class), wherein we plan to discuss concept to completed scenes, and even show one of our favourite scenes that is now in picture-lock.

All this and more is happening here at Orbital Media, and we hope to have more for you soon!  I hope you've kept up with our photos and videos along the way.

Cheers!
--Stephanie Kaye Branham
  Director / Writer

So we've ended out this winter quarter with a lot of footage and excellent work to show for ourselves. I am staying over my spring break week to work on editing our footage in the hopes of getting picture-lock on Rocheleau's scenes in order to record her ADR before she leaves us for London in April.

We still have two warehouse sets to shoot on, which puts us behind schedule by a total of 5 scenes.

We hope to get all these shoots done within the week we'll have left in the warehouse when we return for spring quarter. And this is all hoping that by that time, our lead actor, Foor, will be up to working.  He recently had an accident and was sent to the hospital.  We hope for a speedy recovery for him.  Hospitals are never fun.

More pictures will be posted in about a week, so be on the look out for that as well!

Cheers,
--Stephanie Kaye Branham
  Director/Writer