A Few Words On Nutrition

Woke up this morning feeling terrible, and it took me a moment to remember why. I determined that I must not have eaten anything yesterday, being far too preoccupied with KW2 matters. Completely forgot. I worked all day and night and nary a peep from my guts.

What was I doing all day?

In the morning I logged footage, Tape 051417, and wasn't that a blast. When I first started logging tapes 3 months ago, it was fun to watch the raw dailies because it was like finally being a part of the shoots. (As mentioned in the Production Report, I returned to L.A. after filming my few scenes.) But a man can only take so much rewinding and fastforwarding. I'm now intimately acquainted with every scene, every take, every mannerism and expression on record. And I took notes. Luckily, that was the last of our 18 tapes.

The next thing needs a little explaining. I ended my logging and moved directly into constructing a torso. When Chris gets here, one of the things on our to do list is filming a small gore supplement involving the slitting of duplicate prop necks. Correct, months back I scuplted these necks and fitted them with internal tubes from which blood should gush. The torso is simply a foundation for the necks, which are interchangeable.

Fashioning the torso basically meant combining found objects. The base is an applebox, the midriff a milk jug, and the rest is wire armature layered in bubble wrap. And it's scary convincing. Example:

Walked into my living room today and startled on seeing a short, hooded George W. Bush staring at me from the corner. In my weakened state I'd forgotten that Scott mounted the mask on the headless chest, leaving an eyeless and bloated Dubya looking like he just came from a Weezer concert.

So making the torso took a while, but not as long as you'd think. Working with metal gave me the itch to build another armature, so after consulting with Scott I shifted to creating a chimera. This is quite plainly a hood put over lights which, when combined with thick diffusion, soften shadows on actors. I made one way back early December '04 when we were starting production, but it stayed in Tuscaloosa. Since we're filming more than a couple gore pickups over Thanksgiving, and will continue to do so, I thought I'd better get a jump on it.

Well, what I must have got was more like a gravity-defying kung fu flying leap on it, because lo and behold, come 6 a.m. I was done. I'm not sure if it's because the new chimera is smaller than its predecessor or if it's because the wire is extra malleable or what, but it took 2 days less than last time.

Maybe last time I stopped to eat.

Matt

There's Something About Merritt

A lot has been going on. I've spent the last week or so alternating between the behind-the-scenes editing and Poppet construction. Editing's been met with a litany of obstacles, mainly software issues. A lot of solid sound mixing has been lost to export and playback issues. Countless hours wasted negotiating with the damn thing, lucky to get even 45 seconds onto these compilation tapes I'm making.

The compilation tapes, which are filled with raw outtakes, documentary footage and sweetened splices alike, will eventually be the source tapes for the actual DVD extras. Soon, all full composite tapes will be dubbed off and logged as a time-saver for Chris and I when it comes to the real-deal edit.

You heard right, director Chris Merritt's visit to our modest office/barracks begins next Wednesday Nov 23. He's chomping at the bit, naturally, since he has seen little to none of the existing movie. Scott's got the meat of the thing in-pocket, and the parts he'll let me see are nothing short of butt-shattering.

But although he'll lend a fresh eye and make some notes, where Chris may come in most useful is in helping me structure this behind-the-scenes garbage. By the time he arrives, I'll have done all the needed paperwork to make this thing cruise right along.

Matt

Red Team Go!

Post is humming along smoothly. I've passed the halfway mark editing the film, with a lot of the remaining tidbits consisting of shorter scenes and scenes that draw on material from KW1. All that remains then is to complete the matte work on the composites, render the effects shots, color time the scenes, and mix the audio. That last part is fun because it includes us recording foley effects in our living room with Chris Merritt over Thanksgiving. Send fruit.

As Matt has mentioned, our premiere date got thrown off a bit and we were forced to re-evaluate our time frame. The bright side of that is that it gives us some extra time to spend in post. I wish I could cut KW2 for a living, but fortunately for me I'm working a pretty grueling work schedule these days. Everyone involved in posting KW2 works in post-production professionally, by the way, which means they deserve mad props for sacrificing their spare time to make this a kick ass flick. I should mention Todd Beabout, who is the Combustion artist helping us do matte work. And who could forget Burke miles, motion graphics sensei and title sequence designer. And, of course, our very own Matt Stewart, who as you all know is tirelessly compiling making of sequences and gag reels to pepper the DVD with special features.

Who knows if Bill Moses will ever bother with a post-production addendum to the production report. Given the length of that depraved document, I can't say as I'd blame him. So I just wanted to introduce/thank the post production crew and update everyone on the progress. Trailer soon.

scott