Quiet! Did you hear something?

It's a weird thing: sound.

In most films, the sound person essentially cleans everything up, does the explosions, bottles breaking, etc. Ultimately, it's all pretty standard stuff that's easy to find, and sound person knows how to do.

Then you have something like this. When I'm actually creating an entire unseen atmosphere, it's a very surreal process. Especially after shooting the thing; I'm constantly battling myself. "Wait, he wasn't doing that then". "But it doesn't matter if we see it, because the SOUND will tell us what's happening". "Oh".

So for me, it was crucial to have Megan swing by and let me know if I was anywhere near the right track. Fortunately, she seemed pleased with the direction I've taken. Later, she Twittered that she heard the monsters for the first time. That really hit me. All this time, the monsters were these unseen, unknown creatures and with some clever placement (and some pretty freaky noises), I've actually brought to life that which is never seen or known of.

Pretty damn cool.

I like a challenge like this. I've always appreciated sound because it has the power to completely change the meaning, atmosphere, ambience, idea, concept, or whatever you see on screen. I thought it would be funny to just make everything kazoo effects. Now THAT would change the feeling of the film.

The tough part now, as I work to finish the sound effects, is to keep the creativity up and not let my rational mind keep me from really pushing this story. Or over-doing it and killing the story.

Fortunately, the actors gave me plenty to work with (as far as how high or low in emotionality I can bring the threat).

All I can do is hope I didn't suck. It's tough to invent from scratch that which never even exists in the film. Until now.

Pictures

I have been going through photos we took at the photo shoot so that I can start to layout the press kit. It made me start to miss my entire cast and crew and relive shooting End in August.

As I was looking through the photos I found some absolutely hysterical ones. I love them, but I really can't put them in the press kit because they would just kill the more somber mood of the film. But I still thought they needed sharing. My actors are great people.

These photos were taken by the wonderfully talented Regan Hutson.

Snail Mail

So we mailed out Christmas cards to the entire cast and crew in December. I had a feeling a few weren't going to make it to their destination, but I was shocked when this came to me in the mail.

This was the card Christopher and I sent Shannon our super talented AD. Evidently it got lost and damaged in the postal system. The card got so lost that it didn't come back to me until last week.

I seriously think the postal system owes me a refund.

Back to the Salt Mine

So I am back to work tomorrow. Exciting stuff. Lots has happened in the month and change since I wrote about being laid off.

We achieved picture lock! Yay, woot, cheering, etc. Editing was a long process, but it was definitely worth it. I am now waiting and working with the rest of the post production team; Christy on the score, John on dialogue editing & the final mix, Beth with the sound design, and then of course the million other little things Christopher and I keep doing to polish up End and get it ready for public consumption. This is seriously cool stuff, but it’s also exhausting.

Dave left for England a few weeks ago. I am sad to see him go, but Dave seemed pretty excited about heading back to the mother country. I believe that Pearce is headed back to Canada as well, and Regan is starting an exciting new job that’s taking him away from the local color. All in all as I look back over the people and events that led up to making this movie last summer I am truly in awe – there were a lot of cogs lined up to get End made in the short amount of time that we did.

What’s weird is that by this time I thought I would be so over my anticipation for End to be finished, but the truth is that I can’t wait. I am just as excited as an audience member to see what our final product is going to look like and sound like. I can’t wait for people’s reactions and I am incredibly excited to see where we can get this little film into.

Destiny?

I don’t want to jinx us or give anyone a false sense of destiny, but I can’t let this story slip between the cracks. Megan and I are people of faith and as such we believe in divine intervention and fate. If that isn’t what’s happening right now then I don’t know what is?

Megan got her job back. Yeah, you remember the one she got laid off from on the 27th of January? Apparently the company she worked for realized they made a huge mistake and as a result she’s going to be back at her desk Monday morning like nothing happened. How crazy is that?

I think I’ve mentioned several times that all great independent films have great stories to go along with them ala EASY RIDER, CLERKS, EL MARIACHI, etc. While I am in no way trying to put END in remotely the same universe as those classics you’ve got to admit there have been some pretty great stories that have come out of the production so far and this is yet another one to throw onto the pile.

Think about this for just a minute. Megan was laid off at the EXACT time when we really needed to ramp up post-production and trying to work a full time job and complete a movie all at the same time would have been more than a little taxing. So what happens? She gets about 6 weeks off work with pay (Thanks to the severance package) to devote all of her time to getting END ready to put in other people’s hands. Just as we get END to the point where we can start giving it to the people involved with sound, music and so on (All of which don’t require quite the same time commitments form the Director and Executive Producers) and right as that severance money is going to start running low Megan’s former / current employer calls her out of the blue to inform her they’d like her to come back from her paid vacation. In essence Megan was paid to work full time on the movie so that we could get it to the stage where we need it to be.

If you ask me all this is more than coincidence. This is all more than just a fortuitous spate of random good luck. I’m a writer and there’s no way in a million years I could have scripted this fortuitous, darn near fairy tale type story.

Is END destined to succeed? Is it in the cards or whatever other metaphor you want to use that END is the movie that’s going to break all of our careers wide open? My parents always taught me the negative effects of putting a cart before a horse, counting chickens before they’ve hatched and so on so I’m going to heed their advice and shut my big trap. I will say this though; all this has got to make you think doesn’t it? Stay tuned because I can’t help but think this is going to get a lot more interesting before it’s over.