Today is the first day of the rest. . . ah, fuck off.

It's my day off. I'm at home, I'm broke and I'm feeling very lonely, stupid and depressed. And I only just got up.

On the up side, the day can only go up from here.

Morally superior Morons

I'm posting this now, while I'm still a little Shitty.

One of the websites I visit frequently is SUPERHEROHYPE. It deals with comic to film adaptations. Anything and everything on that subject. AS you can tell, it's the kind of stuff I want to know.

As with most news sites these days, there are spaces underneath where people can leave comments. Some of these things can get a little obscure sometimes, veering wildly away from the original subject.

A story I just read was about Bryan Singer's production company acquiring the rights to some new comic book that hasn't even been published yet - there's a whole 'nother rant in THAT one - which is written by a Guy named Rob Liefeld, whom is the embodiment of everything that's wrong with the comic industry. So yeah, at got my back up to start up with.

Now, as anybody who knows me - let me rephrase that, has been in earshot would know, I was EXTREMELY unimpressed with Singer's SUPERMAN RETURNS. That movie was wrong for so many reasons. I have a whole rant, which really doesn't take a lot of persuading to get me to go into, which I will post up here at some point. I don't seem to be alone in this position, as most of the comments that followed the story were about Singer hopefully NOT doing a Superman Sequel. I gotta admit, I agree with them on this. I was checking out some of the comments, when I got to the last one, which went like this.

Posted by: Ender The Xenocide on July 23, 2008 at 11:05:38

Well, first off...this article makes no mention of Superman. All these threads are, are a way to totally rip on movies and the people that make them. I would have to say that NO ONE who posts here as any idea as to what it takes to make an actual movie, that's not to say you may not have read a book on the subject but I bet none of you can honestly that they have worked on a big budget movie so what gives you the right to rip on people who do? The bottom line is that Singer has and does know what it takes. I'm an electrician by trade, and if a plumber came onto my job and tried to tell me that I was wiring a light or receptacle wrong I'd tell him where to go. So every hater out there, get your heads out of your asses and just enjoy what gets made and save the opinions for people educated on such matters.

I, hopefully understandably, got a little shitty about this. So I replied thus:

Posted by: ShannmanLives on July 23, 2008 at 11:38:22

Oh, and by the way, Ender. Who am I to rip on movies, especially Superman Returns? I'll tell you. I'm an audience member, I'm a Superman Fan, and I'm a movie lover. And that's all the qualifications I need. To use your analogy of an electrician, if I paid money to have a light switch installed in my house, You're right. even though I understand the basics of how it works, wouldn't know how to do it myself. But if that light switch doesn't work, then I have every right to complain and want my money back, or want someone else to do the job properly. Even though film is a much more subjective realm, being a creative endeavour, the end result is the same. We, the fans, the people who love Superman and the character he his and what he represents, entrusted Singer to take that character and craft a story around him that reminded us of why we love Superman in the first place. In his - sorry to say - selfish and narrow minded interpretation of the character, Singer gave us a film that bored the average film goer, and angered and annoyed the fans. He let us down. Pure and simple. And we have every right to voice our dissatisfaction! And to say we have no right to complain, simply because we couldn't do it? We know that it can be done! Ironman worked fantastically! Incredible Hulk was a HUGE improvement over it's forebear. And just look at what the Dark Knight is doing, and that's a freaking sequel!!

Here's a suggestion. How about you get your head out of your arse and go back to your wall sockets. Stop trying to set yourself up on a pedestal by posting a supposed Morally superior opinion that just reeks of narrow mindedness and low intelligence!! If you don't like these comments, DON'T FREAKING READ THEM!!!!

As for everyone else, RANT ON!! How much does everyone think JUSTICE LEAGUE is gonna suck!!?!

Small minded twat.

I'm still a little bit ticked off at this clown. I'm sure, if given the chance, I could go on and on about this, but it just galls me. I don't even know how to finish this post off. I've made movies. I know they're not easy! But does that automatically make me more or less qualified to judge others? All that means is I have a slightly different vantage point on which to view things!

You don't need qualifications to know you didn't enjoy something. And you shouldn't have idiots like this fuckwitt telling you you're not entitled to your opinion!! He seems to be yet another forebear of the current mentality that doesn't allow any sort of non conformist opinion or thought. If you don't agree with the "moral Majority", whatever the fuck that means, you're automatically disparaged and frowned upon. And god help anybody who ever speaks their mind. It's just bullshit!!

Sorry all. I'm just getting angrier, and I don't think I'm really making any sense, so I better disappear.


Fucking stupid little twat.

The Unflappable Spider-Duck

OK, this one's for my friend Amie, whom I'm pretty sure is the only person who reads this thing.

We all have our obsessions. Mine has to do with a certain last son of Krypton. Others have equally bent and bizarre things that for some reason get stuck in our psyche's. Amie' has just started developing her latest one, which is these weird little collectible ducks.

So, just because she's such a cool lady, and I like to encourage weird behaviour in any way, here's my very own group of ducks, just for her.

The turbo mini jib

Whenever I have a day off, I always feel a little shitty if I don't 'achieve' something. Doesn't have to be major, I just need to know that I did something with my time.

I started work on this thing quite a while back. I got the instructions off of Indy Mogul. It was mostly a measure of getting my hands on the materials I needed, which depended on me having the money left at the end of the week. Which of course, rarely happened. But last week, I had a spare couple of bucks, so I finally picked up the last of what I needed. So here it is. My Turbo Mini Jib.
Essentially what it is is a small camera crane. Hopefully it will enable me to do some slightly trickier shots. I took it for a quick test run this afternoon, the footage of which is below. It's a little shaky, cause the whole set up is rickety as hell. It's designed to be adhered to the top of a tripod, but I think mine is a little too lightweight for it. I've also gotta find a way to counter weight the end, cause it's a battle to operate.

But I have to admit, I'm quite proud of it. It turned out well, and wasn't as hard as I thought. I just hope all the other stuff I'm building turns out as well.

Let's put a smile on that face!

Got up early.

Made it to the 12 O'clock showing.

It rocked.

That's all I'm saying until more of my friends have seen it.

Friends. GO SEE IT!!!!!!!!!!

So close, and yet . . .

As I'm sure I've mentioned somewhere on here, I work at a cinema as a projectionist. It has it's moments. One of which is sometimes being able to see certain films before they come out. Now, unless you've been living under a rock, you would know there is a new Batman film starting this week, a sequel to 2005's Batman Begins, aptly titled "The Dark Knight". Being a huge Superhero fan and a Batman fan and a big fan of the first film, I have been eagerly anticipating this film.

Now, I can be an extraordinarily patient man, but up to a point. If I need to wait a year, a month, a week and a day for something, then fine. That's how long I will wait. But if I have waited that long, don't you dare ask me to wait a year, a month, a week, a day and 10 minutes. When I get to the point when I don't have to wait any more, I don't want to wait anymore!! The best example of this was when the first Spider-man movie came out. I patiently waited YEARS for that to be released. On the first day, I drove all the way in to where I now work, ironically, to catch the earliest session I could. I was finally in there, sitting in my seat, waiting for the movie to start. The music stopped, the lights dimmed . . . and I had to sit through nearly half an hour of ads and trailers. I was so pent up with frustration, wanting the damn movie to start, that by the time it started, I was mentally willing the opening sequence to hurry up and finish so the movie would start. I had to calm down and remind myself that this WAS the movie. And here in lies my current dilemma.

We had the prints for Dark Knight arrive yesterday. 3 of them. So I have had access to the film for the past two days. And it has been driving me NUTS!! I mean, here it is. This film I have been so looking forward to ever since they announced it. All made up, ready to go, on the platter, right next to the projector. I know how to thread it it up, I know how to set it going. And I've been on close for the last two nights, so it would have been no prob to hang around till after the last sessions had finished and turn it on.

But I can't.

We had an official memo come in from one of the big wigs of the Company, expressly forbidding ANY non-session showings of the movie. So, even after the movie starts, we can't put the film on after work for any reason. Security is so tight on this damn film, that we are even going to have security guards, sent out by the distributor, with night vision goggles watching the audience in every session. We get the film 48 hours before the rest of the world, so any pirate attempts of the film are going to be made in the next couple days.

So all of this added together basically means that I couldn't get the small thrill of being able to watch the movie before everyone else does. Sucks to be me.

Of course, I don't have to pay to see it and I'll more than likely see it several times in the next few days, so don't feel too sorry for me.

Feeling Crowded?

Since I was having a day off, I spent my last $15 bucks today on a DVD copy of the Movie "Tarantula". It was directed by Jack Arnold way back in 1955 and stars John agar and Mara Corday. It also has a brief cameo from a very young Clint Eastwood. A Tarantula grows really big. Panic ensues.

I just watched a scene where they were trying to offer some sort of explanation of why the tarantula got so big. I always loved this part of those movies. At some point they would talk about some actual science theory, combine it with a few other theories that are actually plausible, then mix it all together into a big crock of shit that at least sounds good.

The whit coat guy in this movie was talking about population explosion. HE estimated, given the figures at the time, that the planetary population could swell to 3 and a half billion by the year 2000. Keep in mind that this was a movie, so that estimate probably wouldn't have been conservative. I just checked on Wikipedia, which means it's gotta be true, that earths population by the year 2000 was over 6 B billion. As of July 8 2008, the world's population is believed to be approximately 6,708,700,100. So their estimates were more than 3 billion out.

Next time you go looking for a place to live, might be a good idea to get up real early!!

Back to The Lot

No, I'm not making a sequel. Well, not yet at least.

Tell me something. When the hell did one O'clock in the morning become 'not that late' to me? I just looked at the clock, and it's nearly one. I'm quite tired, could use the sleep, but at some point have decided that one in the morning is to early for me. God knows when I got reprogrammed for that. But I digress

I've put an early version of 'The Lot' up on Youtube. I'll embed it down below. I've been getting some quite positive feedback from it. Heck, the first comment was posted in under 5 mins, praising it. That's a very good feeling, let me tell you. While I was up in Wagga, visiting Chris and Amie, which is always worth the 5 hour drive, Amie - God love her - put it on and made every one watch it. Some had already seen it and really enjoyed it, but none of the others had seen it by then. They all seemed to enjoy it, which is very positive. The one down side that a lot of people have mentioned is the sound. It's choppier than a stormy sea. I fully admit this.

Unfortunately, at this point, sound and lighting are my two let downs. Haven't had enough experience on either to really know what I'm doing. Yeah, I know. Read a book. And I have. I know the theory behind the two, but theory and practice are as different as Ocean and desert. So, like everything else related to this, it's play it and see.

On that note, I've just pent the last several hours here at home playing around with the sound. And I have to say, I think it's working. It's sounding a hell of a lot better, the choppiness is gone, and it flows really well. there's no huge, distracting changes in the background noise anymore, so it's not throwing off the audience. I'm really happy with it.

So, a few more tweaks, possibly a little bit of Music from Miss Lucy and this thing will e ready to submit to Trasharama. My first festival entry.

Wow. Seriously.

The Money-Go-Round

This isn't going to come as a surprise to anyone.

Like many people, I am on the modern day tightrope of life. I'm trying to find a balance between what I want to do and what I need to do to survive. The films and the comics - they all come under the want header. My job, my bills - they come under the need. And like all who do the daily drudge in order to make a living, my cash flow on different weeks can ebb and flow.

This week has been an Ebb.

This is frustrating on so many levels. Just for the normal day to day things - food, fuel - coming up short is extraordinarily frustrating. But that's the least of it. I got shit to do!!

Tony and I have something planned. Not telling what it is just yet, but I'm trying to prepare for it while I have the time. I need to get some equipment built, but to do that I need to be able to buy the equipment needed. It's not a lot of equipment, so it's not that expensive. But when you have no money on you what so ever, it's no different between a minor or a major price tag. No cash is no cash.

God, I want a better job.