"Patches" in Production!

So some pretty cool stuff has been happening with our script, Patches in Perception, over the past week. I've been meaning to update this blog sooner, but things have been a bit crazy.

Start it off, we had a script read-through on Monday with a bunch of actors who were gracious enough to take time out of there evening to come and read for us. Millions of thanks go to Lori Watt, our producer who coordinated the whole thing. The read-through went amazingly! It was great to be able to hear the words off the page and to get a feel for the pacing of the script. Unfortunately, Marc was not able to be there as his is down in Antigua again, filming a feature-length action flick, so I taped the read for him to see and get a feel on what it sounds like. We also got a LOT of great advice and suggestions on what makes the script strong and what areas can be altered in order to improve it as a whole.

As well I sent the script to one of my instructors from VFS, Bruce Spangler, who is finishing his dual-masters right now in Filmmaking and Creative Writing as well as TAing at UBC, for him to critique and gives us some feedback on. The response we got back from him was very possitive and optimistic. He also pointed out a few of the week points in the script and gave us some great points on how to make the script a lot tighter, more to-the-point and engaging.

So now Marc and I will be brainstorming ways to conquer the script obstacles ahead of us and start editing it once he gets back. Feedback is also being awaited from some people that Lori knows and trusts as writers or directors, etc.

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On another note, through the course of the month of February, I have a bunch of workshops through Cineworks as well as other courses required to get Permittee Status to work as a Production Assistant under the Director's Guild of Canada BC. If all goes accordingly I should hopefully be able to start working in film before too long. I hear that there a lot of productions coming up so that should mean work. So here's hoping and looking in towards brighter horizons.

Stay fed.

Let's Make a Movie!!

My roommate Marc and I have been working together on this script that he's been writing for about 7 months now. It's a high school movie, sort of like Breakfast Club meets Superbad. Well finally we got a full first draft absolutely nailed out, all spelling, punctuation and grammar correct, and a story that is absolutely SOLID, so we're pretty happy campers at the moment!

Now what makes a finished script even sweeter!? A finished script with a producer that wants to read it! And that's exactly what we've got! Thierry Tanguy has credits abound working as a Locations Manager and more recently as a Production Manager for a couple Nickelodeon films. Marc is going to meet with him this coming Friday with a copy of the script and see what can be done with it and essential find a way to get this movie made!

Ideally we're wanting to shop it around with me attached as Director and with some of the actors that Marc knows also attached for certain roles, but at this stage in the game we really have no idea how that's all going to work out. What we plan to do is to shoot some of the scenes on our own with some of the talent that we have in mind in order to better sell ourselves with the film. Once again though, we'll see how it goes as the craziness begins!

Stay tuned! ;)

Update on Life

It's been a long time, I know, and I feel really bad for leaving all of my avid blog readers hanging for so long, so here is a quick update on what is happening.

I'm getting a raise/"promotion" at my job at the Dueck Downtown car dealership, which means that I'm going to be able to start banking some money and not just scrape by as I have been doing for the past few months now. And on top of my pay raise and more hours, I'm going to be getting monthly bonus incentives, which will be nice, and will help me prepare for India.

"India? What did he just say? What's going on in India!?"
Well it's funny you should ask, because I've been given an opportunity to work on an action film that is set to be filmed in India, working under the 1st Assistant Director, Shawn Griffith. Basically, the project is on hold right now for various reasons, and they are in the midst of script rewrites and hiring a new director, but it sounds like I'm in as soon as things start to come together! And I'm psyched! =D I have to thank Lauro Chartrand, whom I worked with on the Chemical Evil promo that he directed, as he is working on this film, entitled "Hands of the Devil," as a Stunt Coordinator and Co-producer for lining me up with this insanely awesome opportunity though!

In order to get properly prepared for the film in India, I've decided to take some weekend workshops at Vancouver's own Cineworks (a society for local filmmakers). Luckily enough, they've got some courses coming up that are right up my alley! And I'm pretty stoked about that as well!

In other news, I've been writing a couple short films that I hope to get into production for sometime not too far away, and I've been helping my roommate, Marc, edit the script for a feature film high school movie he's been writing. So with that in mind, if the India gig doesn't start up soon than June 8th, there is this Screenwriter's Summit being held that weekend that I would LOVE to attend! This feature that Marc has written honestly has a lot (and I mean LOT) of potential, and we're pretty gung-ho about getting it producer (with me attached as director, hopefully) one way or another!

As for Memoirs of the Blue, we're slowly conquering some technical difficulties and starting to get some rough cuts rolling along, as well as collaborating with some musicians and such for the score, so all-in-all it's a pretty exciting time right now! We've also got a temp website up, and should hopefully be getting a teaser trailer on there some time in the near future, so check it frequently!

I'll try to keep more up-to-date from now on with my blog, and I hope you all the best!
Peace!

Scoring a Big One for the Team!

Big things are starting to happen with our post production for Memoirs of the Blue, especially since we recently got an offer from a man named Torsten Stenzel to give us a hand with a wide range post production sound, ranging from music scoring to foley to mixing and mastering!

Ever heard of a musician by the name of Moby? How about ATB? York? All Saints? DJ Taucher? Faithless? DJ Tatana? What about Tina Turner? Stenzel has working with all them!

With 16 years of experience in producing and composing, coupled with a lifetime of classical music training, and a culmination of over 3 million records sold worldwide, I don't think that our post production sound needs could be in much safer hands than his! Check out his website for some samples of what he has done.

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In other news, we've finally got all the footage captured and everything organized and ready to edit. Right now we're just waiting for our counterpart, Luke to send the harddrive with all the footage to Vancouver so that editing can get under way and I can begin cutting together a mind-numbingly extraordinary teaser trailer for you all to drool over!

We're currently in the process of setting up a website for film; a launching point for us to market the movie, hype it up, and get people interested and excited for it! Things are finally starting to really fall into place in post production, so we're going to try our best to keep momentum up and let it snowball from here.

Stay tuned! Big things are sure to be happening now!

Don't Quit the Day Job

Guess who just got a job!
....

Wrong... ME! :D

So now I end my lazy binge of doing absolutely nothing and trying to find work, with a part-time job. Now I know what you're thinking; "Part-time? What a slacker..." Well yeah, there is some validity in that, but at present there is some uncertainty as to a possible job in India working on another feature film. I can't really say much more than that at the time being, but I'll keep you posted as to further developments in that area. And with this position possibly available to me within the next couple of months, I'm looking for something that I can leave if I need too without making too big of waves. (Hopefully the folks at the Dueck Car Dealership don't see this... :\ )

So now I've got a means of making some money to sustain me until hopefully this India thing works out, and if not, there's the possibility of a full-time position opening up within a month. So I'm covered either way.

That's the scoop for today, peace ya' later!

Triple Feauture of Awesomeness!!!

Feature of Awesomeness the First:

I got my first official screen credit!!

Last Sunday I went to see the promo screening of Chemical Evil (Directed by Lauro Chartrand), a movie pilot/trailer that I worked on a few months ago doing stunt and screen work for. I brought a good number of friends to see it and it was pretty awesome! I ended up getting more screen time than I thought I would. I had an awesome, slow-motion, flying knee (real Ong Bak/Tony Jaa style) that looked friggin' wicked, but they decided to cut following short fight sequence in which I brought this 220-lb, 6-foot-4 militant guard to his feet, fed him a knee to the ribs, then had him pick me up by the "throat," break my neck, and toss me into the water.

...probably better that I went out and a completely badassed note though! HAHA.

I got a copy on DVD, but I'm going to try and get permission to post it up on the web first.

Here's the Teaser Trailer for it though, just to give you a taste. (Remember, i'm the guy tossing the huge knee to the dude in the fountain! :D)

Chemical Evil - Teaser - The funniest videos clips are here



Feature of Awesomeness the Second:

There's a new Mathew Joki Production up on YouTube, for your viewing enjoyment!

It's a 4-and-some minute piece, satirizing the fitness industry and the rediculous things they try to trick you into (based off of my own experiences).

I hope you enjoy it as much as I enjoyed writing/makeing it:



Feature of Awesomeness the Third:

Turn 6 is just around the corner and the pre-production for my final (a 10-minute short film) is just about complete. At present I have 20 or so actors lined up for auditions and the only real obstacle that I have to overcome now is finding locations (I need a corporate-looking office and a psychologist's/therapist's office).

The title of my project is Prometheus, and the Synopsis is as follows:

All her life, Lena has been haunted by the ability to peer into the thoughts and memories of others. These memories drive her to the point of paranoia, where she becomes suspicious that her boyfriend is sleeping with one of her co-workers, MARCY. In an attempt to reveal the truth and avoid spoiling the relationship needlessly, she begins to dig deep into her subconscious, in order to harness the power that she possesses. In doing so, she instead becomes overwhelmed by what she finds, and with the help of her PSYCHOLOGIST, is forced to relinquish absolute knowledge in order to obtain blissful ignorance, instead.

I put a casting call up on craigslist, and got a pretty damn impressive response! I got 19 actors scheduled for auditions and several more pending, so I'm pretty damn psyched for that!

I can't wait to start production on it now.
That's it for today though, keep it real!

Random Updates

Bad news first:
My computer decided to shit the bed, so I'm being forced to buy a new one (BOOOO-ERNS!).

But the silver lining woudl be that I get to upgrade from what I had, for less than what I paid for my previous laptop. It's been a week now of only being to get on a computer when one of my housemates vacates for a while and it's driving me nuts, I don't have jackshit to do with my days! :(

Good news:
I'm fresh into my stream in the VFS Foundation Program, and I'm finally able to focus my studies on Film!! Hurray!
Directing, Story Developement, and Cine & Location Sound seem to me like they're going to be my favorite classes this term.
Sound Design would probably be interesting, but the instructor is far too tangential and I don't actually remeber learning anything from the first class we had with him... although I can tell you his life story and the history of Xerox, Apple Computers, Adobe, and the conspiracy of why the price of gass is so high...
Pre-Production and Art Direction just sort of seem like they're going to be a bit of a bore -- Art Direction moreso as it seems to be a needless reitteration of a few previous classes from terms 1 and 2.

This term I'm going be preparing my final project for term 6, something I still have a lot of thought to put into...

Another developement is that I may have the opportunity with a few other classmates to shoot a short film down in the Carribean (Antigua) after schools done, with a bit of a budget aswell. But as far as I'm concerned, that's mostly still up in the air so i'm not investing too much of my expectation into it right now. I'll have more on the situation as it unfolds.

Peace ya later,
Mathew Joki Esq.

UFC 68 in Retrospect//On The Lot: Video Online

Well, my first 3 picks where succesful, but the one I made on gut instinct was a flop.

Randy completely OWNED Silvia right out of the gates; awesome fight! He even managed to out-box the guy who has nearly a one-foot reach advantage over him. To reitterate, it was awesome!

Franklin came out on top and MacDonald threw in the towel after taking a vicious beating in the 2nd round.

Hughes also brought his A-game knocked Lytle around a bit -- although Lytle did put up a decent fight.

All in all it was a pretty good fightnight, nothing spectacular on the whole, but seeing Silvia get pumped like he did made my day! :D


ALSO:

Our movie (Flatline) has finally been posted up on the On The Lot Website, so check it out HERE and vote for it as often and with as much "rank" as physically possible!
I promise that I'll remeber all of you if I become rich and famous off of this!
(http://films.thelot.com/films/22426)

Much love,
Mathew Joki ESQ.

On The Lot//Doculink

Okay, been busy this last couple weeks and haven't been able to find the time to post, so I apologize for that. So let's do a brief summary catch-up:

On The Lot:
There's a new TV series that FOX is about to put out called On The Lot which is basically another reality TV series based around filmmaking. It's being hosted by Steven Speilberg and the prize is a job at Dreamcast, and a one million dollar budget in order to make produce you're own show. Though I/We didn't have time enough to submit anything "good" we decided that we would try and submit our movie Flatline (still yet to be posted on the On The Lot website).

Doculink:
Brett and I went to this Doculink meeting last weekend to get some ideas and insight into documentary film making, and to do a litte bit of networking. I got some ideas on how to shoot, fund, sell and get media coverage for a couple of documentary ideas I have.

DocIdea the First:
And friend and I are currently working out the logistic, practicalities and pitch opportunities for this travel documentary/reality TV program that would feature the two of us hitchhiking the globe; litterally. The idea is to cover 6 of the 7 continents--being that Antarctica probably doesn't have the most friendly of hitching environments--all on a limited and budget and limited time frame. The big thins we still have to figure out is how to get across the Atlantic, how long it will take us, what the danger of certain countries is and how can we get a network to invest in us. As soon as we get that all figure out, I'm going to put together a pitch package and send it out to some perspective networks.

DocIdea the Second:
Ever since I left Thailand, I've been longing to go back and start training Muay Thai again! My idea was to sell the idea of me training and competing in Thailand as a reality/documentary/travel series. I was thinking about possbly getting a sponsoreship by a supplement company on top of that and trying to sell the ideaand get a professional documentary filmmaker/camera operator to do this with me. Brett has also expressed some interest into the idea and is thinking about doing some filming in Nepal and surrounding area while I'm training.

I'm planning on developing both ideas and seeing which sticks or seems to be more lucrative. I guess we'll just see how it all turns out...

PS. That shoe is dedicated for you, Jessica! :D

Mobile Jam Fest Competition

There’s a film competition that I’ve submitted some of my work to and they’ve opened up voting for favorites just recently so check some of my work out at http://www.mobilejamfest.com/ and maybe vote for some of my stuff if you don’t think it’s all that bad. The prizes include Xbox 360's and upwards to $10 000 in tuition (NICE!)!

My submissions:

The Red Army [Animation] ( http://www.mobilejamfest.com/content/tpl_videos.asp?cat=9 )
This is/was Abstract [Experimental] ( http://www.mobilejamfest.com/content/tpl_videos.asp?cat=12 )

Networking Party

Yes, I realize that I'm busting these off rather rapid fire... but I just like to talk a lot! ;D On with it now:...

In term one of Foundation we have a class called Project Development & Presentation Design (http://www.vfs.com/faculty.php?id=1&staff_id=481). This class basically teaches you how to meet (“network” with) “people who are in a position to help you”, to sell (“pitch”) your ideas to people (the ‘higher-ups’) and to convince people to do what you want them to do – for as free as possible!

On our last class we had a mock-cocktail party/networking exercise where we all got together, dressed up for an early Halloween theme with snacks and beverages. The objective of the class was to practice our networking skills; to talk with as many people as we could, get to know something about them, exchange some contact info if we didn’t already have it, and most importantly, leave a lasting impression so that they remember you – in a positive way. A prize was provided by our instructor (the beautiful and talented Jessica Clark ;-) ), for the person who people remembered the most by the end of the party. Well, needless to say, I won by unanimous decision! (HUURRAAAYYYY! :D) The Prize? Something that no one should ever be by without… PENS! Mini-pens that you can easily hold in your pocket!

The networking party was so successful that I managed to get Jessica’s contact information, and some really good information and tips on a documentary project that I’ve got in mind (a blog entry for another day).

Here are a few pics that I just got from a fellow student:

Alijan, Marie (AKA: Glen), Chris K., Jaclyn, Jessica, Nathalie

Brett, Jaclyn, David, Daphne, Johnny, Alijan, Jae-Woo

David, Me, (Nathalie), Alex

Jaclyn, Brett, Me, (Daphne), Shab