So I almost forgot I had one of these. Haven't posted since early July!? Eek!! Well, I've been really busy with family and work. Its pretty damn hard to juggle everything especially if your an independent filmmaker. I mean your trying to make projects that you want to do but you got more important things to worry or to take care of such as family and your job. With all this said, I've had the time to work on a project of my own, here we go...

G4TV's 'Attack of the Show' was hosting a contest entitled the Fantastic Fest Movie Trailer Contest, where you create a movie trailer based off a video game. However you had to make sure that it hasn't already been made into a Hollywood film and it had to be 2 minutes or less. There's no big cash prize involved, you just get the privilege of your trailer being screened at some Texas Film Festival where Uwe Boll(yes, Uwe Boll!) will pick one winner out of the two finalist. So my buddy Charles and I went to work brainstorming ideas.

We ended up picking the game 'Left 4 Dead' which is a first person shooting game where you kill zombies. I was very hesitant about doing this because of time, actors, location, and budget. We basically only had 2 weeks left! I was stressing out big time on this! Charles's idea was very good but way outta our reach in my opinion. We only had a few days to prepare and nothing sounded like it was coming into play. So for me, I bailed out on the idea. I decided to come up with other video game trailers. I started thinking about the old school Atari and Nintendo games but I figure a lot of people will be going that route. So I thought about the Rockstar game 'Manhunt' which came out for the Playstation. It was a very controversial game. Very bloody and violent. Basically you play a convict, James Earl Cash, whose put into this city where hired gangs are there to hunt you down and kill you. Your job is to kill the gang members by any means necessary. That's the basic idea for the game.

After some convincing with Charles, we decided to make it. We will eventually make the 'Left 4 Dead' trailer some day, I hope! So Charles got his buddy from San Diego, Oscar, to play the main role. I thought he totally looked the part. Now it was up to me to make or buy the masks that the gang members wear. I turned to all the cardboard I had laying around and went to work. I bought a hockey mask similar to the one in the game and threw some paint and fake blood on it, came out pretty rad! The masks were a lot of fun to make. I just wish I had more time to think of a shot list or possibly do some storyboarding. I want to wrap this blog up...

On the day of the shoot, I was still prepping the masks and getting props altogether. We chose to shoot on the Cal State Fullerton campus (like so many of my projects, haha!) First day went by smooth, it was just me, Charles, Oscar, and his gf. Really run and gun kinda shooting. Quick and simple. Second day was a little more stressful. Charles's friends that were suppose to come out to help, didn't show up so luckily I called a few of my friends to help out. Kelvin and Robert who are my old high school buds and Chris whose my very good friend. Like I said, it was stressful not knowing what I really wanted to shoot (note to self: make shot list or do storyboards). I usually do storyboards but this time i t was harder because I was making a trailer, I didn't know exactly how it was going to turn out.

I had less than a week to finish, basically only Monday thru Friday to turn it in. Didn't know where to start or how to start the trailer. With a lot of editing involved and time, I finished. I tried to submit it at work but the internet there is so slow! So I tried to get home as fast as I could. Once I did, I submitted it with no problem! The website said the finalists would be informed sometime close to Sept 11th, and now its Sept 21st. I assume I'm not a finalist. I saw some of the other entries and by the looks of it, they all took it not so seriously. Over the top acting. Trying to be funny or comical. I guess that's what their looking for maybe? I don't know. Maybe I'm just hating ;-) I didn't take mine to be funny or over the top. I think I am getting a lot of love from people about how it turned out. Anyways, I'm done typing, till next blog-time!

Check out the trailer and show me some love!

Here's a couple of videos from the wedding DVD I put together for Mark and Irene's wedding.

A short music video montage of how the night went down.



Remember I said how awesome this couple is? Well check it, they gave their family a surprise dance number!



Thanks Andy for uploading them onto Mark's account! Hopefully Youtube doesn't take the videos down due to copyrighted music but knowing that I just typed this, it will probably happen. Watch them while you can and enjoy!

Hey ppl,

First blog entry of July! So in the previous entry I talk about making slideshows (also my friend's mom loved her retirement slideshow, good to know!) and I also want to let you guys know that I do weddings as well.

It all started in April when I got to film my first wedding with my friend Andy. Andy knew this couple, Mark and Irene, who were getting married in early April and wanted someone to film it, so Andy offered his services and threw me into the mix, we sat down with the couple to talk things over, and as they say, the rest was history! We packed up our Canon HV20's and headed over. It was an awesome wedding/reception. Mark and Irene are truly an awesome couple and I wish them the best.

So after filming, it got down to editing everything together. Andy did the main feature while I handled all the little special features; their first dance, a music video montage, guests congratulations, and making the DVD menu and casing for it, which ended up being quite a lot of work when I think about it. Damn you Andy!

Anyways, we got done and Mark and Irene invited us over for dinner and we watched the DVD and they absolutely loved it, which is always good to know and to see their reaction was truly priceless. I love those moments. =)

Check out the DVD menus I made for them!

After I was done with the disc I got help from my friend, Ritchie, (who actually works with me and does our company's DVD artwork) to do the DVD artwork for Mark and Irene's wedding. He did an awesome job! They loved it. You can check out his blog/artwork at http://ritchieramirez.blogspot.com


So there's that. Just keeping busy and trying to earn a few bucks as I go. This weekend I got my cousin's wedding to film. I'm going to be flying solo on this one so I'm a bit nervous but I gotta MAN UP. I finished their slideshow last night, so hopefully it all goes well. If anyone is interested in my services just email or IM me.

Hey guys,

So I've been doing slideshows for my enjoyment for quite some time but now I've been doing some for clients. I did one for my Bro's wedding. It came out pretty nice and people were impressed so HOPEFULLY I got some more clients coming in.

I just recently finished doing a slideshow for my friend's mom's retirement party, which is coming up this weekend. After SCANNING close to 200 PHOTOS, I am done. My friend enjoyed it very much and invited me to come to the party, so hopefully I can check it out and see what his family thinks, especially his mom. *crossing fingers* Hope she likes it.

Too many photos... All had to be SCANNED!... BUT HEY... I'll do it!



So I would like to offer anyone reading this, my services! If your too lazy, got no inspiration, or lack the editing software, CONTACT ME and I'LL DO IT! Let me help you make your event memorable! Weddings, Retirement Parties, Birthday Parties, if you got the pics lets make something nice!

Next week my cousin is getting married and him and his bride-to-be asked me to make them a slideshow, so time to get to work on that!

Been updating the look of my blog a lot. Trying new things out such as fonts, colors, and templates. So far I like the one your looking at. Its simple. Colors aren't too bad. I noticed on the other templates that my videos and blog title pic were overlapping, making it look messy. I chose the stretch template so this one is just right.

Just an fyi, I posted it yesterday but that's the blog title pic I made on Photoshop. Kinda generic but it works for now. When I get more time I'll go more into it.

I really am starting to enjoy blogging. While at work, I do a lot of conversions and encoding movies, so while that's going on, I don't got much to do but to wait for it to finish. Thus, blogging comes into play! So if anyone reading this blog, lemme know? I'd like to check it out!

I will end this post on a sad but yet funny note. Last night me, Tiff(wifey), and Kylie(daughter) were playing Wii Sports and Kylie wanted to play bowling so we did. And good Lordy is she getting better at this game! I won't make any excuses although I haven't played it in a while =P but she beat me by 20 points! Tiff kicked butt that set but it was overlooked by Kylie's all time record score! Did I mention that she's only 3 years old! Jeez... video game prodigy I tell ya... check it out!

I just got done editing this event I attended at Cal State Fullerton. It was called 'Relay For Life' and it was sponsored by the American Cancer Society. I shot this during the night so the shots are really dark. I should have got some footage during the day but I was waiting for my buddy Charles to get off work, since he was taking photos. The first video describes what 'Relay For Life' is all about. I actually got the music from the artist Moby, who has a site (www.mobygratis.com) where you can request for songs that he made and if you explain that its for a non-profit organization or your a student filmmaker then he will let you download the song at no charge. So thank you Moby! Check it out!



The second video is just interviews with the students. I asked the students 'why they are relaying?' and stuff like that. A lot of good interviews, they were all awesome. And the music beat I used for this was by my buddy Danny. So thanks Danny! Check it out!



This was all for a good cause and hopefully students will watch this and it will make them come out next year. Hope you all enjoy it!

Hey guys!

So I'm starting up a blog AGAIN! The first time I did, I think we can put a 'FAIL' on that BUT this time I'm taking it more seriously. I will be posting up my work and maybe some random things here and there. So thanks for stopping by and I promise to keep this blog going strong! ... I hope!!