Starship: Apocalypse premiere

Last night was the premiere of the science fiction feature film Starship: Apocalypse, sequel to last year's Starship: Rising. Once again, it debuted at the Action On Film festival. It was interesting to watch this, as I shot the movie almost 3 years ago. I also enjoyed catching up with some of the cast and crew that I haven't seen in quite some time, some of them since we originally shot! Good times.

More Rogue Warrior: Robot Fighter!

And here are a few more screengrabs from Rogue Warrior: Robot Fighter.

Rogue Warrior: Robot Fighter screengrabs

I've finally been told I can post some screengrabs from the feature I shot in March, called Rogue Warrior: Robot Fighter. We shot some days on stage, some in the desert, and some in Malibu. The movie is currently being edited, with pickups to come in the future (pickups were pre-planned).

Space Command: Redemption

Alright, I'm about to head off to San Diego Comic-Con and thought I'd squeeze in one more pertinent update, as it has a panel there this year.  Earlier this year I worked on a science fiction feature film called Space Command: Redemption.  We shot the first part of the film in April and the editor has been preparing a sneak peek trailer for their panel at San Diego Comic-Con.  This past week, they decided to do a few pick-up shots on our nearly completed bridge set to round out the trailer.  I've been extremely busy shooting the pilot for Nobility, but managed to coordinate shooting the Space Command pick-ups on my one day off.

We only had a few lights, but fortunately I've been working closely with our ship designer and builder to integrate as much lighting into the design of the ship as possible.  This allowed us to shoot the pick-up shots relatively quickly and with a minimal crew (basically just my gaffer and I) and a very small lighting package.  I was quite pleased with the look we got.  The directors asked for Star Trek Into Darkness but with a less flat look to the lighting.  I think we got a pretty close look to what they were asking for and we managed to do it for just a little bit less money than J.J. was working with.

I'm looking forward to the show going back into production (probably in late August or early September) so that we can shoot the final two-thirds of the movie.

Nobility (continued)

After another nine days of principal photography, we wrapped on Nobility.  This was my first full two camera shoot (three cameras on one day!) and I'm starting to see why some DPs hire camera operators for all the cameras.  It can be a bit tricky to know what exactly all the cameras are getting when I'm busy operating one of them and not able to closely supervise the others.

Lighting was a big challenge on this project, as the sets kept changing and I'd come back in the morning and have to light a completely new space.  Our lights were minimal and I had no gaffer or G&E crew, so it was all me.  We managed to make it work and even wrapped early a couple days, partly in thanks to our director and 1st AD running a tight ship.  They kept things moving, but were always willing to give me an extra minute or two to move lighting around if I needed it, which I greatly appreciated.

We shot RED Scarlet for most of the shoot, with a little bit of Epic Dragon tossed in and we even dusted off a RED One MX for a couple days.  Due to it being a low budget affair, I couldn't afford to hire my normal 1st ACs so we got a revolving door of random guys.  I ended up pulling my own focus for a good chunk of the time (as the ACs were pretty green), but we also got a couple really good guys that I would certainly consider hiring on future gigs.

It was a pleasure working with our very talented cast and Walter Koenig was hilarious.  I'm curious to see what they do with this in post and am looking forward to seeing the San Diego Comic Con trailer they are cutting for the Nobility panel.  This, along with Space Command (which I'll post about soon), makes two projects that I'm shooting that have panels at San Diego Comic-Con this year.  I'm really excited to go and check them both out.

A couple pictures here of Walter Koenig:

A Change in Direction

It's always a bummer when you make something, only to have your efforts fall by the wayside.  I shot a pair of music videos that were a lot of fun, but ultimately left on the cutting room floor at the end of the day when management decided to rebrand and the aforementioned videos no longer fit with the new marketing direction they were taking.  Oh well.  We had some great costumes, sets, and production team, and I thought we got some great stuff.  But sometimes that stuff just doesn't make it out the door like I would have hoped.  Shot with RED One MX on Canon EF lenses.  Below are a couple framegrabs from the music videos that could have been.

Starship: Rising

About a year and a half ago, I shot two science fiction features simultaneously.  The first of the two, Starship: Rising, finally made it through post and is finished.  It was made with a tiny crew and we shot the two films in less than a month (plus a couple pickup days since then).  There was a ton of green screen work and SFX, so I learned a lot about that world (which has come in very handy on various subsequent shoots where production didn't have an FX supervisor on set).  I just found out that it'll be showing at the Action on Film International Film Festival this August, for what it's worth.

Shot on the RED One MX with EF mount lenses.  Directed by Neil Johnson.  An awesome soundtrack by Charles-Henri Avelange.