Apparently, I have Terrible Taste

So, I'm kind of done going to Book Court. You know, I figure I should go to local independent bookstores. I'm so wrong.
I asked about a couple books, neither of which they had. One was The Wind-Up Girl. They were out and they didn't bother to pick up the paperback version of it.
The other book was the new Cherie Priest novel which I knew had been published because I read an interview about it.

When the guy at the counter finally found the book he said. "Oh yeah, I remember this book. I think we passed on it. That's... not any reflection on your taste. We're just more of a literary book store."
So yeah, I'll be going to the non-literary book stores from now on.
Although maybe they passed on the book because the heroine has such clearly bad trigger discipline.

Questions

My question is whether Nat and Dave are going to put a hit out on me for what I've done to their script, or whether they're going to want the satisfaction of doing the work themselves.

Mitch Gross on shooting in Log format. He says that the Arri Alexa can handle 14 stops at 800 ISO. Holy cats. Really? I thought the best negative color film could handle was only 12 stops or thereabouts.

Who is left alive in this robot war script?
Foxwell

Rathbone

Hammermill

Cage

Tango (killed on page 25)

Ponce (killed on page 32 which is, right now, the center point of the movie).

Normally Tango has the scanner. Hammermill doesn't pick it up until after Tango is killed by the blue-class marauder robot.

Skybucket Records

Here's an independent record label with a number of cool acts on it. Specifically it has the upcoming record by the Delicate Cutters, my buddy Chance Shirley's band.

Back in the day it was possible to make you some money with an indy label. That day was 1979. June 22nd, as I recall.
Actually, there have been some working labels up through the 2000's. Mostly niche-stuff like deathmetal et al. And the insider information I have from what we might call a "significant" indy ("indy" meaning it's not associated with any of the major labels at all -- it's not a "brand" of, say, CBS) is that they won't even bother with a band that can't sell 150K units. That's one hundred fifty thousand CD's nowadays. You know, what with iTunes and the Interwebs and whatever.
Tyrannosaurus Mouse, of course, can sell scads of records because we'll have a complete burlesque show at all our concerts. I wonder if I've adequately explained this to the band yet? I think I did, but they thought I was joking.

Pitching

The Asylum on how to pitch movies to them:

So, how can you write for The Asylum? Well, if you’ve got an interesting take on a mockbuster for a studio movie that is coming out in six to twelve months, that isn’t a remake, sequel, or based on an old television series (good luck); we might read that. Or if you happen to know the buyers at Netflix or Redbox or Comcast and can ask them what types of movies they need, we’ll listen to that pitch.

Honestly I can't figure how Netflix buyers can justify a production to the Asylum, but if it can then more power to the Asylum.

I'm just going to keep linking to *600V's awesome art.

Script Notes Which Make No Sense to You

I think Tango should have the scanner. Hammermill seems more like a heavy-weapons kind of guy. Of course, the fact that I killed off Mooney in the first scene doesn't help matters.
What I do know is that there will be vestiges of an early screenplay in the shooting screenplay and we'll end up working those out on set.
I've got some scenes here where the characters are all together in a corridor and then suddenly they're separated and fighting different monsters. That, uh, needs to be cleared up.

This dude makes some beautiful images.

Today in the Machine

So I'm busy destroying David and Nat's screenplay. So that we can shoot it. Very soon.

And because I'm a horrible person.

Here's who's alive on page 21:

Foxwell

Rathbone

Hammermill

Cage

Tango

Ponce

We have to make sure we're making a bigger deal about going into AI territory on the mission.

I may have inadvertently cut the explanation about the workers losing contact with the military. Or maybe I was asleep when I was editing it.

Go to the Film School Thesis Generator. Then type in "Clonehunter". C'mon. You know you want to do it.

I was a big fan of Pride and Prejudice. And you know I'm a big fan of assassin androids. Or cyborgs. Or whatever. <a href="http://video.latam.msn.com/?mkt=es-xl&amp;from=sp&amp;vid=0b59f191-5161-4abe-852a-ff0c7f4f3503&amp;from=es-xl&amp;fg=dest" target="_new" title="Hanna">Video: Hanna</a>

Things to Buy

How to be Passive Aggressive on Your Blog

And make your friends hate you.

Cage is now a woman.
Mooney got killed in the first scene.

Mooney's description now is more like Cage's used to be.

CAGE, weapons and ordinance specialist - a frightening tank of a man, a 240 pound killer - flexes his muscles; his left arm is a tangle of wires and hydraulics.

MOONEY - soulful - checks his weapon. MOONEY and CAGE exchange a grin, and MOONEY slugs CAGE's arm with all his might. Adding to the punch: MOONEY has two BIONIC HANDS. 

Tango is the radio guy. Doc Ponce is still the medic.

Although actually I'm not being passive aggressive on my blog, I use my blog to take notes. So there. 

BS2

The new Blake Snyder Beat Sheet Calculator.

Because I keep forgetting where it is on the Internet.

Why On Earth?

Does the banner on top of this site keep changing color? I swear I'm not doing anything.

Reality

So I watched an episode of Face Off tonight. That's the SyFy "reality" show about makeup artists. I know one of the contestants, Anthony Pepe. We actually hired him to make exposed guts for our movie Pandora Machine.
In fact, we've used those guts on almost every movie we've made since then. Hmm... really he should have an IMDB credit on all those pictures, shouldn't he?

I worked with Anthony again when I was a sound mixer on The Attic. I recall him having a hard time on that picture -- as far as I could tell it was mostly because the director didn't really know what he did. In any case, I think I'm on the record for not thinking the director on that picture having any idea what anyone does. But that's another story.
+++++
Uh. We never sold Pandora Machine to any Russian-speaking territories. And I found this image on a Spanish-language site.

So uh, wait, you can actually buy a version of Pandora Machine in Russian? Is it being pirated in Kazakhstan as машина пандор?

Poot

I've heard nothing but good things about this show, "Before Placing Me on Your Shelf". It's playing a very limited run at Theatresource.

(They loaded in at ten in the morning and did a three pm show in the afternoon -- having teched and run through the show in the leisurely five hours between.)

Der Krieg Gottes

I just finished Kameron Hurley's "God's War". I could talk about the fascinating world. Or how she convincingly creates a matriarchy (which is very difficult to do -- essentially all the men are sent to war so there simply aren't any 18-to-45-year-old men around). But I won't. Instead I'm a-gonna talk about the art on the cover.
The art on the cover is great.
OK. Now that I'm done with that...
I got Day 2 out to the lab today. Hopefully that will all go without a hitch. One day, in the distant future, buyers will accept hard drives instead of (egads!) DigiBeta tapes.

Great Britain Is A Silly Place

Now I do go around making fun of Great Britain. Which I do for good reason, Great Britain needs to be made fun of.
Mostly what needs to be made fun of is it's name. Nobody knows what it is. I mean, except for this guy. This guy actually understands it:

You'll note that he's American.
I'm actually under the impression that British people are not taught this in school. So yeah, it would take an American ex-pat to figure it out.