Filming update - May 2016

In regards to the short horro film I was solely going to make, it has been delayed due to one of the main location rooms currently being unusable so I'm not ready yet to start filming as £100s need to be spend to get it looking like a normal room.

In addition I'm in the process of renewing my old failing editing software which the Yosemite operating system on the Mac rendered useless. When both these issues are solved, I will start filming it and hopefully have an interesting film to show. It is unfortunate I couldn't make the May 13th date but reality once again kicked me in the teeth and made filming what I had planned impossible.

In the meantime I have been helping Rob again with his horror project. An Evil Dead fan film titled ' Book of the Dead' we are planning to finish shooting in the fall. We have shot the introductory sequence, and the film contains various accurate replicas from the original Evil Dead, with permission from Tom Sullivan himself to use a replica book of the dead and Kandarian dagger. We are also fundraising it on indiegogo, and if anyone would like to know more about the project and see the footage so far, visit the page: https://www.indiegogo.com/projects/book-of-the-dead-an-evil-dead-fanfilm--3#/

More updates will come over the next few months regarding my own short.

In the meantime, keep supporting the horror movie genre!

-John

New short horror film being scripted

Having thought a lot about this year and the lack of horror movies going on as well as my own projects, and rewatching Sam Raimi and Josh Becker shorts films I own, my frustration has started me thinking of new ideas for a short horror that I had in mind a few months ago, to be entirely shot by me.

This would be a relatively easy project to accomplish as I would rely on nobody but myself, but this creates a challenge in itself. This will not be a found footage movie or handheld camera, and you could ask yourself how will he shoot and star in it without crew unless it's all boring still shots? I have thought of getting around this.

There's an additional aspect to the film I have come up with to make it even more challenging that I will keep under wraps until it's release, but if this is all achieved you will see how I used my limitations to make something creative and unusual.

I am aiming to release this short early summer, hopefully May 13th. And no this is not another Friday the 13th fan film!

In the meantime I'll be tweaking the script, planning the shots and hopefully filming in April once some of my other life issues are out of the way or the most part and the location is ready.

Will keep you updated as the project develops...

January 2016 update

2014 saw my final attempt at completing the ambitious horror short film and after many failed attempts since 2013, we cancelled the project because the resources and support for the project from others just wasn't there and I didn't have a strong enough core team. Some films are never meant to happen and I learned this. So now I am trying to get my sh*t together over this year to create the right conditions to make another film finally, that will be live action and not an animation.

 

 We got as far as a headcast

At the moment there are certain life goals and issues that need to be attended to before I start something up again. In the meantime I have been helping people with their own short films. One in particular I am pretty proud of being a part of called the 'Lateness of the hour' directed by our special effects person Rob Mclaine who worked on our fan film Friday the 13th: Jason's Blood.

My roles included assistant camerawork and lightings person, as well as playing a small character, all of which are much easier and less time consuming than producing, casting and writing a short.

You can watch the film here:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=22AwkLqoWSk

As soon as I have my own project in pre-production, this page will be updated... and I do plan on definately having something ready before the end of the year, even if it is a modest short film, and from here I will attempt again to reignite the flame of Horrorville Productions, I have some difficult barriers to get through before even starting this however...

In the meantime I'd like to mention that the very last episode of Deadpit radio (the great horror talk radio innovators from Kentucky) was broadcast last week and many in what remains of the horror community were sad to see them go. But just like me they have major life events going on which made it impossible for them to continue the show. But just like me if they find the time they will come back, hopefully when the horror genre is back in popularity again.

 www.deadpit.com

Don't stop believing in great horror......

Freddy vs Jason vs Leatherface vs Ash: The Final Chapter

After years, I am proud to announce that we have a new short film up on youtube, in the form of an animation fan film. This project was originally abandoned for a year and a half as I felt no one was interested and knowing that is was extremely difficult to get right, what would be the point in doing it if there was no demand for such a project? This changed when I recieved enough calls from my youtube viewers after they saw teh teaser trailer to complete it.

It has been a very challenging task to achieve, as I felt it necessary to up the ante by doing something original with the backgrounds WITHOUT GREENSCREEN, and spending a lot of time of the sound designs, so that these figures actually sound exactly as they do in the films. This was difficult because I had to remember or search for certain words, sentances or sounds from each franchise, then check if the sound is useable and free from any unwanted music in the track itself . I also had to find shots of useable rooms within the actual films where there are no characters standing in the foreground or background, as I wanted it to seem as much as an unofficial crossover sequel to each original franchise as much as possible. In a sense this is a sequel that is a standalone and therefore draws it's own outcomes as to who lives and who dies and how. I think I achieved a more authentic homage than my other attempts at animation.

The funnest part was of course animating the fight scenes and lighting it to match the backgrounds. This was also challenging as you can imagine, I tried to avoid reflections and loss of continuity. A few scenes were actually redone becuause the errrors were too obvious to see.

This film will mark the return of production from Horrorville. Anyways enough talk... Here's the link to the animation: Youtube video

ENJOY!!

2012: The missing year and what may be coming in 2013

Firstly I apologise for the lack of blogs for an entire year.

Having said that, 2012 was a much better year than 2011, despite the lack of filmmaking output and the work troubles. The London 2012 olympic games and the so called apocalypse came and went with no consequence to me at all. I had two great holidays - Amsterdam and Cornwall, and went to some decent gigs/concerts - The Twins of Evil Concert in November, Rob Zombie was the best in terms of spectacle, performance and atmosphere. At one point there was a giant devil on the stage! Marilyn  Manson was ok, but I feel he could have put much more effort in. Overall it was a great night...

 In terms of filmmaking, I edited shot and edited an online advert for Gym in the park in January 2012, In July/August I collaborated with a friend of mine and write brief outline to a sci fi horror we were going to film, however the film never progressed as I didn't have enough money or free time off work. Shortly after I spent 3 months doing a challenging script rewrite for Brendan Gilday for his slasher film Reapers which may hopefully go into production in a few years. It was challenging because I've never done a re-write before, so I didn't know at first how much should be changed. I tried my best with it and in my opinion made it a more uncomfortable film to watch probably due to my negative outlook on life at the time.






In September I took up a new hobby - Airsoft, which is similar to paintball shooting, but more professional in tactics and with BBs and better guns. This has pretty much filled a lot of my free time, and has been a costly but exciting endeavour. Each location we go to has it's own uniqueness that changes the tactics of warfare, that and the various different opponents we come up against make it hard to know what to expect. A few weeks ago I was in an abandoned shopping mall in Reading, shooting a Terminator, two weeks before that we were in a former military outpost, the month before that we were in the woods and then in a bunker. In a couple of weeks time, we will be an indoor/outdoor abandoned urban environment around a building completely full of concrete graffiteed walls.

November 2012 was eventful not just because of twins of evil concert,  but because I finally got a girlfriend that appreciates me and accepts me for who I am. Although she lives far away from me, we make the effort to travel the distance (60 miles) to eachothers places pretty much every week.

Another side thing I've been doing in my free time is verifying conspiracy theories that are worthy of my attention. I say this because the Reptilian theory I have seen absolutely no evidence for, despite having listened to David Icke and others for many years on the subject, and drawings of a walking reptile in an ancient egyptian hieroglyph is not enough evidence to prove this.

Other theories, such as mind control research, the new world order, extraterrestrial visitation all hold much more weight and are worth further investigation. I will be spending 2013 checking and double checking all the evidence that is available, then I will hopefully have a closer understanding of the truth. I advise anyone reading this to do the same, as the mainstream news is not there to tell you facts, it is there to promote different agendas and play down, exaggerate or even lie about the world/universe around us, therefore independent research must be done from multiple and credible sources!



On a lighter note, this year I will be releasing my animated film Freddy vs Jason vs Leatherface: The Final Chapter shortly after my MAC  pro computer is repaired and if the footage is still intact. Regarding other film projects, there is nothing planned at the moment, although it is still possible I could shoot something cool and short with my camera and editing equipment if I have the time.... We shall see.

I will keep you guys more updated.

-John

2011 - The year of bullshit happenings (a personal blog)

Glad to see the end of such a shit year. Very little good or productive actually came out of this year. It is very easy to notice how many things went wrong however. Some people say that it's easy to be negative. What I usually find is that those people:
a) Like their job b) Are or have achieved most of their goals and c) Generally have much better luck and lastly seem to have everything going for them in life. Being around these positive people, I've always wondered why this happens. I can only conclude there's a bunch of different factors which they are lucky enough to have. imagine if these same positive people were placed in a country like Japan, specifically the south, where your home was destroyed by a flood, many people you know die from drowning and then you have to worry about the nuclear radiation from the tsunami damaged nuclear power plant. Would you have a positive outlook then? Could you simply ignore the bullshit life threw at you and simply ignore the negatives? I just think people are extremely naive to suggest that thinking positively will give you a truly positive life. As proven in the example above, you can have a tragic event happen out of your control completely, you could be in a car accident that cripples you and causes numerous health issues later because your friend is drink driving, or you could catch a virus or disease that remains for years...

I guess this is why I like horror movies. Horror movies are quite honest, in that they accept that negativity is a part of life. Shit happens. People don't want to admit that shit happens to anyone at anytime. Some are luckier than others but in the end something bad will happen to them as well.

I don't expect 2012 to be a great year. I can only hope this year that I don't have the health problems, the major problems at work, the friendship issues, the dealing with asshole behaviour and the general depression all of this causes.. I'm bound to have one or all of these things happen. I've somehow got to change my environment. I think this is truly the only way I can give life a better chance of being good again.

Once my health is back together I will finally film the short I've been on about since September. I dunno I suspect this film will show my current state of mind.

November Update

Hi guys and girls, just thought I'd update you on the staus of my new short film project.

The original halloween release date for the short on youtube has obviously been missed, this was due to a lot of busy happenings at work and in my personal life during September and October. The Halloween period particularly did not go down well for personal reasons. November has not been that busy, however I have struggled to get a crew together with only 1 person committed to helping me film, as long time filmmaking partner Jag has got his own commitments. 2 crew members that were originally going to help out also have their own committments so can't be involved. Additionally the original actor I really wanted for the lead role is not interested. This means casting will only begin after I've got a crew of more than 2 people together, so far only have 1. I apologise to anyone who thought this film may be out on halloween. I've removed the video blog which said this and will maybe only put it up when the next vlog is there..

The good news is the story has expanded into something much cooler and creepier, and there's even potential for another film related to this one. I've also given the film the title 'Pure Evil'.. Which fits the tone of the antagonist and is quite easy remember.

My main goal is to get one more crew member committed to film on saturday nights, then casting will be done along with other stages in pre-production.

Hopefully my next update I'll have more to say...

-John