My Big Day

August 2, 2008 was a big day for me. I made my normal “to do” list as I had my morning coffee, then promptly ignored it as the gravitational pull of my computer sucked me into editing Spirits Among Us. Over the last several days I had been working with the musician who was helping me with the music score. On this special Saturday I began blending his music into the movie along with several song from another artist, that I had forgotten about. I worked about 15 hrs with only one break to have dinner and watch a movie with my wife. Okay, I admit I did stop for bathroom breaks, I’m not an animal.

I actually had a breakthrough on some final scenes needed to round out the movie. So, for part of the day I was in the attic, dressed in heavy black clothing shooting a few scenes. If you are familiar with Texas summers, you know that the attic is the last place you want to be. I know some readers of this blog (Bob, John, Dawn) that can confirm that.

As a result, the movie went from “hmmm, I guess this will be okay” to “hey! This is starting to look like my vision. In fact, this is pretty darn good!” I am really, very, extremely excited about this movie for the first time since shooting the scenes about one year ago. Up to this point I just wasn’t certain that it would all come together. I can now see the finished product, just a few more tweaks and adjustments and this will be a movie worth watching that will put important Biblical truths in front of every viewer. It was definitely a God-inspired day for me. It is Sunday now, and I’m putting all this work aside to celebrate and worship.

The photo is something I’m playing around with for the dvd cover art.

Getting Close

Well, I have the movie in the musician's hands now, he is adding the music score. This will greatly improve the movie. I am looking forward to seeing/hearing the finished product. It looks like I should have this ready for the premiere party in October, with copies available by late October.

Slow, but Sure Progress

Okay, I see that a month has passed since I published the post stating that I was getting ready to hand the movie over for music scoring. But...I am actually still tweaking the editing and hope to get it into his hands within the week. The edits are greatly improving the movie. Some of the scenes are getting really scary, even to my jaded eyes. I am starting to see the finished product in my mind and it is looking much better. The music score will be a huge improvement. More to come.

More Progress

I just went over the editing that Craig did on the movie. He made some very good improvements. I continued editing for about 8 hrs today. There is more to be done, but the movie is looking much better. I am rendering it now so I can get a copy to the man who will be doing the music score. I am anxious to see it with music.

I think the movie may be complete in August, with a premiere party in September, and an official release on DVD in October. Only one year later than my original schedule.

Sorry no photos or video clips yet, maybe later.

Video Clip

Okay, I decided that the cast and crew deserved to see a little more of what they worked so hard to complete. This is a clip that has preliminary sound effects, music effects, etc. It gives you some idea, but is far from complete.

Getting Closer

I'm very happy to announce that I am about 80% complete with post-production! I am heading overseas, again, to finish an engineering project, but while I'm gone my friend Craig is continuing the editing work on the film. I am happy to have a fresh set of eyes on the post-production, I was getting a bit numb. He was the cameraman for my short film "Jessica" and has been doing editing and other production work for several years. I look forward to getting back from Thailand and seeing how he has improved the film.

I think that there is a reasonable chance of having this completed in August 2008.

Check back in about 3 weeks for an update.

Milestone

Hello everyone I am excited to report that I just completed the rough edit of the movie! I had an unexpected break in my engineering projects, and I used the time I've had over the past week to edit the movie. It was so exciting and refreshing to get back into post-production. What remains is sound clean-up, sound effects, music track, visual effects, and fine tuning of the edits. In summary, I am about 70% complete with post-production. Here are a few screenshots.




Check back next week, I should have another update and maybe a movie clip.