You Wanna Blog To God? Let's Go Blog Him Together...

IOU: 9,000 apologies for not blogging enough anymore. :(

IOtons of other people tons of money (car registration, insurance bills, passports, security deposits, church). :( :(

IOCornell one transcribed 90 minute interview by sun-up. :( :( :(


Do the math, it = my life sucks.



But let's see. On the remarkable side of things, I actually secured an apartment (! win!) in North Hollywood and will be moving in with bearded buddy Beard at the end of the month to officially commence our ongoing campaign against parties, dating, happiness, and social norms in general. Regrettably, tomorrow's Nate's last day in LA -- the guy's had enough of California for now and has decided to pack up and head back to New York. All our great projects will have to return to being trans-continental. :< However, we still have a trip to Japan planned, so more misadventures are to ensue later in this year... OUT OF COUNTRY!

Speaking of which, thanks again to everybody who voted way back in July for NEEDLEMOUSE! I have no clue whether I blogged about it, but just to rehash quickly, video game developers at SEGA hosted an "I love Sonic the Hedgehog" video contest for his 19th birthday, and Nate convinced me we should enter something. So in true Fungus-Ridden form, I penned a musical up, churned out a song, and then the two of us spent two weeks (and let's be honest, a little cash) building costumes and shooting it ourselves (with selective help from a few spare -- talented -- hands). It seems like ancient history already, but to be perfectly frank, one of the best things to have come from the contest (besides a free trip to Japan and an *international* award-winning film) was witnessing the power of YouTube in action. Needlemouse is sitting pretty right now with some 25,000 views since it went live a month ago. Nothing I've ever posted has had a successful internet reaction or fanbase before, so it's been startling, uplifting, and inspiring to see some genuine buzz stirred up all over the net. Granted, Nate pointed out a music video of his with 100,000+ views, but for an entirely original film, 25k in a month isn't bad. At least, it's loads better than any of my other work. So it's made me consider some other future musicals to test the YouTube audiences with. Wicker Man: The Musical, anyone?

I've also been editing The Prince of Australia: The Sands of Pleasure recently. And by editing, I mean, working like a MACHINE. I think I was inspired to try finishing a rough cut before Nate left, so he could do his own character's voice-over. Now I realize that's impossible... but seeing rapid progress has inspired me to keep editing constantly anyway. It's such a crazy movie... Everybody has a rough idea of my general disdain for *PRODUCTION VALUES,* particularly when they interfere with my ability to stretch the creative capacity of a movie. FOR EXAMPLE, in this movie, our hero encounters a hag, a troll, a hip-hop genie, a sand monster, and a power-crazed hell-beast. His sidekick/broadsword is a talking chicken with a musical number. He fights the villainous Red Lobster as well as an army of fur-faced Olaff warriors. He explodes someone's head, throws somebody under a truck, and has a hand burst Alien-style out of his chest for a third of the movie. He valiantly fights and kills numerous adversaries, and his chicken sidekick slaughters a number more. The chicken's stunt double even steps up for one of the late climactic battles.

Without money, technology, or scores of professionals, this movie is as good as impossible to make effectively convincing (if you would like to share some pointers on my resource management, though, please be my guest). But I'm primarily a CREATIVE force in movies, so that's what my work tends to focus on. If I were a cinematographer, perhaps my work would look a little better... but really, who wants to see me making films for the purpose of shooting nice angles? The only reason anyone likes my movies is because they focus so sharply on the story and characters!

Right, my transcription needs to be finished. Ramble over with. Back to work!

The Cleaning Lady Picks Up Blogs. She 'Blogs.'

A) I need to compose more. I can't wait to get a new place with my own room again, so I can set up my massive writing/editing/animating/composing lab and Frankenstein out some new creative media concoctions. (Bwahahaha!)

B) <- This looks like a smiley wearing sunglasses.

C) I picked up a brief stint at Comic-Con this year as a photographer's assistant on Morgan Spurlock's documentary (he did Super Size Me and Where In The World Is Osama Bin Laden, you may remember). Comic-Con was AWE-SOME!!!- ...but I need to go back again next year so I can hit the panels, pick up freebies, wear costumes, and do tons of other cool stuff with the armies of nerds attending each year.

D) My new musical, NEEDLEMOUSE, just won me a week-long trip to Tokyo, Japan! Sega sponsored a Sonic the Hedgehog 4 promotional film contest, and judges from America, the UK, and Japan ultimately selected my film as the North American grand prize winner! Nate co-directed with me and we just got our paperwork in to Sega. Now all that's left is to pick which week we want to book our flight and meet up with Sonic Team at Sega headquarters overseas! And tell you me this: I've THIRSTED for the chance to visit Japan for ages. Thirsted like a were-wolf thirsts for the blood of a virgin. Only more than that. I'm still all wound up about it and can hardly imagine what it'll be like to leave the States for a week and tour around Japan on somebody else's corporate bill. Siiiiiiiiiiiiiiigh! (if you're reading this and you supported the film during the contest, thank you!)

E) I've got a new DVD collection I'm trying to race through production on now containing most of my old films. The catch is that if I work quickly, I can actually work my second-ever feature film into it... which remains only a quarter edited. Given it needs massive voice-over and rotoscoping work, trying to pound it out entirely in weeks may be impossible... but I'm stoked to have purpose to try anyway!

F) Oh, yeah, and Nate and I also just shot a super-teaser for our upcoming horror film 'THE BEARD 2' yesterday. It turned out pretty epic... Everything The Beard (1) had and was, to the T. A major concern we've had in writing the sequel was giving it a thorough monster movie feel by fleshing out the story elements while still remaining faithful to the qualities the first movie expressed most: humor, simplicity, momentum, and light-heartedness. With Nate's help, I've been penning out some new material and twisted a couple old ideas to fit both sets of criteria, and it's beginning to truly look and feel like a Beard movie... enhanced! We're putting it out for a Halloween web release, so there should be plenty of time to toy with the film before it's finished.

G) Forgot, I also saw an advanced screening of Scott Pilgrim vs. The World with director Edgar Wright in the audience (Q&A afterwords). That's where the blog title's quoted from.