Been working on the trailer for the past couple weeks, along with finishing up a couple small animation segments and harvesting effects for the sound design.
Before I could get cracking on the trailer's final sound mix, I needed to render out high quality voice clips (the ones I had been using were low res working files). I opened up the sound project Nate and I started a year and a half ago in Digital Performer. The project contains every single line of dialogue organized into separate tracks by character name.
I got pretty sentimental scrubbing through some of those tracks... it brought me back to two winter's ago when Nate and I began to record our voice actors in the bathroom-turned-sound-studio in his small house on Mole St. in South Philly. Nate and I were practically neighbors at the time, living less than a block away.
Now he lives in Los Angeles, far far away.
And much time has passed.
I remember the elation I felt when an actor nailed a line... and my characters, who had only previously existed in sketch and script started to become living, breathing things. I remember the hours Nate and I spent sitting on his couch with his roommate Jeff's lap top, sorting the bad takes from the good. It was hard work, but it was a great time. Though I wish Nate all the success in the world out in LA, I miss having him here, close to the film. A living, breathing character in my life.
While listening to the character tracks in Digital Performer, I was struck by how many lines had been cut from our original script during the filmmaking process. Five pages, at least. Maybe ten. Monologues slashed, bad jokes given the axe. Self indulgent sentences cut short, made economical. Made clearer. Ideas refined. Purpose honed.
The film is so very different than what it was. More grown-up. More honest.
Over the past month Goat and I have been struggling to distill the film into a two-minute trailer. A tricky job. We made a complex film. It was difficult to find a format that would showcase the various story elements at play, all of which are as important to the film as the heroes journey. So many characters, so many motivations.
But we did it. Tonight, after two and a half years of work, I'm proud to offer you the first glimpse into the strange word I've been living in for so very long. Goat is compressing the file as we speak, and soon Mike Almquist will be uploading it onto the website. In the meantime, I think a small celebration is in order. Time for pats on the back and a few rounds of drinks! Then back here, to make sure we're golden.
I'll see you folks in a few hours.
cheers,
MPH
TO BE CONTINUED...
