Kiwi Space Patrol

Well, Episode 1 – Camp Farquiddity has gone up at the website.  As of today we have four episodes pretty much completed.  I was going to do a one-episode-per-week mad rush with adrenalin surges and a side order of craziness as our modus operandi but Cormac “Mr  Sensible” Cossar said we should have four or five up our sleeve in case we get behind.

Which is smart. A little too smart …

Anyway, of the four in the can, this is by far and away the crappiest. When I first saw the footage we had I thought it was pretty much unsalvageable, and as I had already screwed up Day One with the microphone nonsense, I was a bit forlorn.

But it came back from being amazingly god awful to something god-awful lite.  Given it was made by four people in a basement, without a great deal of experience, talent or cocaine, it is … still crappy.

There is plenty to comment on … the wide shots which should have been much, much tighter; the loose acting which should have been much, much gooderer, the focusing, the continuity, the model work.

But the making has been the thing. Oh  how I love to hear the laughing lilt of IT workers as they do take after take of me getting hurt or injured, however slightly, in whatever ways they can come up with. Mr Cossar, Mr Tashkoff, I salute you.  Pricks.

Anyway, yesterday being a Saturday we did the seatbelt scene for Episode 5 and then did Dobbo the Australian Robotic Service Enterprises online help which was done by Chris Nixon.

Back, many years ago Mr Nixon was one of the stars of a Massey University Drama Society production of, as I recall, Trelawney of the Wells. Nowadays he baffles clients with his brilliance or some other b word at the NZIER where he specialises in economics for animals, or something.

I dragged him in based on his ability as a former MUDS feature player and he didn’t disappoint. First he went out and paid for a tee shirt because I had forgotten the Aussie one I was going to get him to wear. Then, when he didn’t get his second piece to camera right until well after the 27th take, he courageously kept going. Now that’s determination for you! Next time, he’ll just have to LEARN HIS FECKING LINES!!  OK, so I didn’t send them to him till the morning of the shoot. Is that an excuse? I mean, he’s an economist for goodness sake!

On the Friday Cormac and I had fun dropping Scone in a Can on each other. A real can as well. With the label done by Steven Qian. Many takes on Cormac’s nude nut. Commitment, that’s what we’ve got. We’re picking up that talent stuff next week from the dairy.

Cormac’s hard work on the website is there for all the universe to see at

http://www.kiwispacepatrol.co.nz

This is our main site for viewing the episodes and the outtakes and whatever other crap is to be seen.

The rather cunning plan used here is that the gentle viewers watches via the viewing frame embedded on the site.

The two advantages of this are that it keeps the screen size from getting too big (embiggendness is always a bad thing when the focus puller has astigmatism), and hopefully the cool graphics that Steve Qian has done around the screen rub off subconsciously and add to the viewing experience, leaving people thinking they’ve just seen something a lot more impressive than they did.

Well done those men!

OK, Episode 1 is up Monday, March 29. While it is the worst so far, it is also the longest. Surely that averages out a bit …

Cormac (Gunner Gossamer), Janet and Alex (Commander) enjoy the rushes of Bill getting whacked in the face for a few takes.

The initial shoot was on December 27. I went in a couple of hours early to check everything was fine and dandy. About the only thing I didn’t check was that the microphone worked properly. Or at all. And since sound is kind of important, I raced down to Dick Smiths to get an external mike which was completely inappropriate for the purpose required. Cormac and Alex took this all in good grace, apart from thinking the odd bad thought about my competency which I ignored. No matter how deserved.

We shot Corm and Alex’s dialogue anyway with the onboard mike which was a good exercise for everyone. Particularly when I cut it together to show the strengths and weaknesses of it all. One lesson: Don’t look at me behind the camera for approval at the end of every take.

We kept two shots for the full version. Even though there is a glaring mistake in one. See if you can see it. Hint: Might be found in conjunction with the Dentrassi.  And yes, there will be a few more Hitchhiker Guide references.

Anyway, I went to TradeMe, and found a shotgun mike being sold by a dude called Paul who has a lot of music and sound gear in his wee warehouse in Upper Hutt.  (Check out seller listings for Ommi. He was a lifesaver, and even knocked a few bucks off because the packaging was a bit damaged. Damn fine man, that).

So the sound went a treat, and we started again at 4pm and finished about 9.30. I am about to start cutting that up from two hours of tape to three minutes of the episode one. Many, many takes were done in three, two and one shot versions. I think I may have been a bit loose on the closeups so we may have to go tighter in other episodes, but we wanted to get the flashing LEDs in that Otto and Albie Moloney Waldmann did. And as they are the high point of our production values, it seemed the best thing to do.

There was a lot of laughing done, admittedly most of it due to the tres  sophisticated witticisms floating around, and not so much due to the highly unsophisticated script. Janet is now our boom operator.

My initial plan was to design a film where the camera and sound could be locked in place to basically make the three of us able to run the whole shoot. But that’s a bit tricky during a three-shot.  Plus, like many of my initial ideas about anything, it was stupid.

In most scenes you will notice looks of intense concentration on the faces during shooting. This is because Corm and Alex copied Marlon Brando’s acting technique, particularly the one of reading the script off camera. Personally my eyesight is so buggered I couldn’t even manage that, so my takes usually varied greatly as I made up stuff. Corm was concerned that I was being too critical of Timaru. I don’t think I was.

This had better be the XXL model or Gemma's work is about to be rapidly undone.

Of course, once I don the Kiwi Space Patrol Sous Chef battle shirt, it shall once again magically turn back into a sow’s ear.

The one with all the fancy stuff is Commander Alex’s. It includes the shoulder patch that Alistair designed and Embroidery Specialists in Wellington made.  I only had 10 made due to budgetary constraints. Most of them were pretty round. Well, spheroidal. Which is in keeping with the theme.

Steve Qian came up with a banner for the website proper. It is of such luminous beauty I had to tell him to hide it lest its glory outshines the final movie.  Well, I can bloody guarantee that now and we haven’t even started shooting.

It's a beautiful thing. It also has a built-in neurotransmitting spinal-linked computer. Though Alex doesn't know that yet.

The set, as put together by Australian Robotic Service Enterprises.

Well, we got promoted from the concrete alcove to the Hidden Studio of Storage, deep within the mysterious rabbit warren of the Olde Building of the Dominion Post. (Thanks Tim Nunan and Wayne Hunn. And Rowan for the big pannelly things).

Cormac and I lugged this goddam desk up from the furniture storage area, the big bally things came from a Lower Hutt company (if you want to know more, ask me, but I think it’s kind of a secret … I’ll check with Corm). The seats came from Upper Hutt for a buy off Trademe (Great trade, thanks Pierced1). Funnily enough, as I took a load of crap up to the Silverstream tip for the olds, there were two old car seats lying there waiting for the bulldozer to deal to them. I should have leapt in and grabbed them, but I feared being mocked and pelted by the locals.  Hard crowd, that Silverstream tip lot.

Anyway, Gemma has the costumes in hand, we have some flashy led lights from the Otto, Albie and Pold1e Moloney-Waldman Special Effects Co-operative, and we had the first reading through of the script.  There were two laughs. In 45 pages. Is that good?

Hey, it's cheap.

It’s not that things haven’t been happening, they’ve just been happening rather slowly.

However,  due to the munificence of our building manager, I have secured this cubby hole/epic production studio at my place of work. It comes at the right price, and should be sufficient for our needs. I may even use the pallet in the back of it as a piece of the set.

The next thing is to actually build the set, get the costumes done and then rehearse.  I have shown the script to a few people and they all hate it, so that’s a good sign. 

The aim is now to start loading them in September. That should beat the Christmas release rush.

Ladies and gentlemen,

Two hundred years after Captain James Cook picked up a hoe in Fiordland, the designs on its impeccably shaped blade have been dusted off and turned into a design that will race around the Internet at the speed of light into the computers of the tens, nay, dozens, of people who come to gaze upon the wonder that is Super Awesome Mega Battle Tank. Quite frankly, I think that is fantastic, though I am occasionally prone to delusions.

See what you think. The link be here.

The hoe/paddle is here.