Colore Non Vedenti Production Blog

Colore Non Vedenti Is Now Finished and Online!!!

2009-08-01T13:23:00.000-07:00

It’s way overdue, but our short film project ‘Colore Non Vedenti’ is now officially complete and online! What started off as a ten minute Film Junk short for Halloween of ‘08 slowly grew into something a little bigger than expected, resulting in a months long process that was definitely a fun learning experience. A big thanks to all of those who helped get this thing finished — be sure to read the end credits! — and a big thanks to the Film Junkies who waited patiently for this to finally come to fruition! I hope you guys enjoy it. You can check out the final film at www.colorenonvedenti.com, where you’ll also find multiple commentary tracks — featuring Jay, Sean, Reed (Gerry), Tom Baychuck, Roman and star David Tompa — and some behind the scenes video diaries! This whole thing was basically an exercise in no-budget filmmaking that gave us an opportunity to be creative and experiment, and I love the idea of throwing these things up online for everyone to see. I hope you enjoy!

Alternate Scene - Tied Up

2009-08-01T13:16:00.000-07:00

Throughout the production of Colore Non Vedenti, there were a couple of scenes that we decided to reshoot for a number of reasons. One of those scenes was the confrontation between Jack and a tied up and possessed Don and Roseanne. Initially the scene played pretty serious -- as serious as a film like this can be I guess -- and tonally just seemed to stand out from everything else. Also, I attempted the black eye make up on Kristin and totally botched it. It was just too heavy. The shitty thing is I actually prefer the lighting in this version of the scene and I think the performances are really strong. I just didn't think it fit in as well. Check it out:

Music!

2009-04-16T21:35:00.000-07:00

So I'm starting to finalize some of the music for the film. We're planning on using some 'borrowed' songs, but I also have to come up with some 'original' music as well. This piece will end up in the final film and anyone with an ear for soundtracks will probably notice that it's pretty heavily ripped off from one of my favourite films. Any guesses? I'm still pretty happy with for what it is.

Back at Work - Jay Cheel

Colour Correction Comparisons

2009-03-29T22:03:00.000-07:00

Now that we're in the final stages of post-production on Colore Non Vedenti, I figured I'd put together some images detailing some of the colour correction work I've been doing over the last couple of months. There's still more work to be done, but I think things are looking better already! Have a look:

Colore Non Vedenti Full Trailer

2008-12-31T10:17:00.000-08:00

I'm not a big fan of cutting together trailers, but I did my best here. This is the full trailer for Colore Non Vedenti. It doesn't have any real purpose other than having something to post here and on Film Junk. Still, it's probably good to have for those interested. Enjoy!

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More Photos

2008-12-29T10:44:00.000-08:00

It's been a while since I've posted some photos. These were taken during our night club shoot and one of our office scenes. As usual, all photos by Dario Ayala. Enjoy!

Nearing the End

2008-12-15T07:29:00.000-08:00

So it's been a little while since I've posted here. Luckily, I can say we've been busy finishing up shooting the film, so it's not COMPLETELY due to laziness. This weekend we'll be doing our final two shoots (minus whatever pick ups we need in the future) and I'm pretty excited at the idea of having all of the footage in front of me to begin cutting away at. I've already got a pretty good rough cut going, and the film is currently sitting at about 25 minutes. I'm confident we'll come in under the 30 minute mark. The past two weekends have included a few re-shoots and I hope to post some pictures later on today. Stay tuned. Otherwise, we're approaching the final stretch. Watch out for a full trailer!

Back in Business

2008-11-11T21:37:00.000-08:00

So after a month long hiatus, we're back at it. We're sitting at about 3/4 shot at this point, and this past Sunday we managed to get a good chunk of footage in the virtual can. Thanks to Roman, we were lucky enough to shoot in a kick ass location. An office space that seems trapped in the 1970's. Check out the pics below!

ALL PHOTOS BY DARIO AYALA

Colore Non Vedenti Teaser Trailer (Sort of)

2008-10-28T07:34:00.000-07:00

After taking a couple of weekends off from shooting, we've started to get back into the swing of things thanks to some confirmations on some locations required for the climax of 'Colore Non Vedenti'. Roman was lucky enough to secure a night club and some access tunnels (underneath our local shopping mall) for the finale and it should be a lot of fun to shoot. Until then, I've decided that seeing as Halloween is upon us this week, it might be cool to put together a 'teaser' trailer of sorts, which is basically just a collage of some of the stuff we've shot so far. We're still missing about 1/3 of the film, including any footage of one of the main characters. So take this as it is, simply a look at some of the stuff we've been doing. So...enjoy!

Colore Non Vedenti/Goblin Man in The Brock Press

2008-10-16T07:27:00.000-07:00

We just had an article written about us in the Brock Press. For those out of towners, it's the local university newspaper. The best part of the article is the continuing confusion over who actually directed The Goblin Man of Norway. "Though Cheel may not have directed the film, he certainly left his mark as cinematographer, editor and music editor. He and director Howard Byrackk gained access to exclusive interviews with the key figures behind the discovery in northern Norway, and gives viewers an inside look at the controversy surrounding the Goblin Man." (Prince of Darkness fans should recognize Howard Birack as portrayed by the awesome Victor Wong) You can read the full article here. Thanks to Dario Ayala and Matt Hadley for the hook up!

Colore Non Vedenti: Video Diary #4 - Truck Stop

2008-10-15T08:35:00.000-07:00

Colore Non Vedenti Video Diary 3 - "Dinner's Up"

2008-10-10T14:34:00.000-07:00

Weekend Shoot = Total Success

2008-10-07T22:16:00.000-07:00

So the weekend is over and I have a few hours of great footage on my hands. All of the scenes seem to be editing together quite well, and Sean managed to get a pretty hefty amount of behind the scenes footage which I'll be editing together once I'm through assembling the actual film footage. Until then, here's some pics from Saturday and Sunday.

EXT. DRIVE IN - DUSK

INT. DINER - NIGHT

EXT. DINER - NIGHT

INT. DON'S HOUSE - NIGHT

Photos by Dario Ayala

Big Weekend

2008-10-04T09:58:00.000-07:00

It's Saturday, and today is the start of a pretty big weekend shoot. Come Monday, we will be about 70% finished shooting Colore Non Vedenti. All that will be left is our last minute ending, which at this point, has become quite the challenge in terms of getting good locations. I'm sure it will work out though.

Tonight we'll be going to a local diner called 'The Lancer' to shoot a scene in which Jack, our 'hero', shows up to answer a call about issues with their cable. (He's a cable guy) The challenge with this scene is the restaurant closes at 7:30 and they want us out by 10. That's two and a half hours to shoot a four page scene. Luckily, they're usually dead on Saturday nights, so we will take some time during their open hours to set up and get some cutaways. It will be tight, but we should be able to pull it off. After this, we'll drive about 30 minutes to a truck stop diner along the QEW highway. Here we'll be doing the exterior of the diner, which consists of the van fight scene that we'd shot some van interiors for last week. That will be three locations representing one. We'll see how well it all matches!

Sunday we'll be doing two scenes as well. The first is the final scene of the film. We'll be shooting it at the Thorold Can View Drive In. I'm pretty excited for this because as some of you Film Junk podcast followers know, we're huge fans of the local drive in theatre. We try to catch as many films there throughout the drive in season as we can. They also have awesome poutine and pickles at their snack bar. Anyways, now that the weather is getting cooler, they have shut down one of their screens, so we'll be using that empty lot for our scene. Hopefully we'll get some nice 'magic hour' lighting as well. The scene isn't very complex, other then some simple bruise make up. Should be good.

Finally, we're finishing up our 'dinner party' scene. We'd previously shot the opening and ending to this scene, so this shoot will only be the dialogue heavy middle. It's definitley not a light scene, but luckily there's only one location and not much happening other than dialogue. The main challenge is keeping all the eyelines in order at a six person table.

So that's it for this weekend. If we get everything done that we need to get done, we'll be in a very good position. Sean will be shooting some behind the scenes footage, so hopefully I'll have something for you guys to look at this week! Stay tuned!

INT. VAN - NIGHT (Fight Scene)

2008-10-02T18:49:00.000-07:00

Photos by Dario Ayala

Official Goblin Man of Norway Poster

2008-10-02T18:31:00.000-07:00

Slightly off topic for a second; I just finished the official 'Goblin Man of Norway' poster. The film will be screening at the Toronto After Dark film festival on October 19th.

Video Diary #2 - Barf Attack

2008-09-29T22:13:00.000-07:00

Sunday night we shot our first semi action scene. The set up is as follows: Our hero, Jack, is attacked by a waitress outside of a diner. She's under some sort of mind control and ends up struggling with him in the cab of his work van. Eventually, she barfs on him. Plain and simple.

There were a few challenges with this one...mainly the fact that we were shooting all of the close up shots of interior action in Roman's drive way. The exterior van shots will be done on location at a local truck stop. (On top of that, the interior of the diner which the waitress works in will be a completely different location as well.) I just wanted to avoid shooting as much of the action on location due to a lack of lighting control and time. Also, I didn't want to deal with the owner of the truck stop complaining about us staging a struggle between a man and a woman in a van in his parking lot. Might be bad for business.

So I managed to set up some lights to generally match the light emitting from the exterior of the location. I'll also place those lights when we shoot there, just to maintain that continuity. One challenge was the geography of it all. Blocking the scene required some thought in terms of how these two actually end up inside the cab of the van. Luckily, this scene will be inter-cut with a phone conversation in which Jack is relaying the event to another character; so we'll have a bit of a chance to cheat the cuts.

Anyways, the scene went amazingly and the actors were great. Deanna Jones and Dave Tompa were troopers in dealing with the 'barfing', selling it right to the last drop. I'm quite happy with the lighting as well. Anyways, here's another short video diary to accompany this scene. I don't want to spoil too much, so I'm making these things somewhat ambiguous. Enjoy!

Studio Logos

2008-09-29T12:30:00.000-07:00

So today I was thinking about production company names and logos. It seems as though some folks think my 'Young & Fast Productions' name contains too much sexual innuendo. Personally, I think it's a litmus test, determining the perversion levels of those who read it. For me, it came from 'Young, Fast & Scientific' (The title I wanted to use for my time travel doc) and was shortened to just 'Young & Fast'. Anyways, I started thinking about some of my favourite studio logos that I remember most clearly from my childhood. There's actually quite a few. If I had the chance to make a film and was allowed to put ANY studio logo at the head of it, it would be one of the following:

Tri-Star Pictures

Carolco Logo

Cannon Logo

New Line Cinema

United Artists (I always thought this one was oddly creepy)

I think I've Resolved the Ending. Thank You Chuck Russel and Frank Darabont.

2008-09-27T14:17:00.000-07:00

I gotta tell you, the past few days have been tough. I've really been struggling with the ending of this film. The main problem is the intentions of this project have sort of changed. It started out as a short for Film Junk and an excuse to try out a few old school sfx. As things progressed, the script got bigger and the participation of some great actor's started steering this whole thing towards something a little more serious. Eventually, 10-15 pages turned into 30+, and some story ideas that were built to sustain a short ended up causing some hiccups throughout the final draft of the script. The ending simply wasn't strong enough.

So today I decided to sit down with a few of my favourite 80's horror films and get into the proper mindset to try and figure this problem out. I started off with Chuck Russel's 'The Blob' remake, penned by Frank Darabont. I loved that movie as a kid, and the effects are still pretty awesome. I also popped in Tobe Hooper's 'Invaders From Mars' remake. However, it was The Blog that sparked an idea in my mind...scientitst. From there, I started from the beginning of the script, going through and addressing any changes that are needed and making sure they're perpetuated throughout the story. When I got to the final act of the screenplay, I basically just sat and thought. I forced myself to solve this problem. This usually doesn't work because it seems the more I force myself to write, the less progress I make. However, in this case, it worked! I simply thought it through and came to a conclusion that works both thematically and logistically! I think I may have something.

Anyways, just wanted to let everyone know that all is good in the world of 'Colore Non Vedenti'. Also, I wanted to thank Dave Evans and Steve Wintle for some helpful brainstorming and humouring me when I suggested an Old Boy homage in which the hero kicks the shit out of a bunch of women in an extended hallway fight.

The Beginning of the End

2008-09-26T07:50:00.000-07:00

I'm currently reading a great book called 'The Greatest Sci-Fi Movies Never Made', and one chapter specifically deals with the whole Alien 3 debacle. Multiple writers were brought on board to take on the task of writing a follow up to James Cameron's brilliant 'Aliens', and it seems like nobody could really settle on anything good enough. It's pretty clear that those involved were feeling the pressures of the financial and critical success of the first two films. The thing that blew my mind was the fact that David Fincher ended up starting production on the film with only 40 or so written pages of script. Sometimes he would be handed scenes on the day and have to quickly think on his feet. Knowing all that, I think he did a pretty amazing job. Personally, I enjoyed Alien 3, even if it's undeniably flawed in certain ways. It sucks not knowing how your film is going to end.

This is sort of what I'm dealing with now. I have a written ending to Colore Non Vedenti, but I've never been very satisfied with it. It was too easy, and the logistics behind it were questionable. It was sort of just an excuse to shoot at the Blue Ghost Tunnel, a great location that I think is creepier in person than it would be on film. (See the Colore Non Vedenti Video Diary #1) So after the failed lighting test, I decided to re-evaluate the ending (and parts of the script) in order to try and come up with something with a little more conflict. I think I have come up with something that's much better, but I'm still trying to get over that final step. There's something missing. Also, this new ending has added two new locations to the shoot, both of which will require some work to secure and shoot in.

So now, I sit and think, listen to music, read, watch movies, and wait for the idea to come. Until then, shooting continues.

EXT. RAILROAD TRACKS - DAY

2008-09-25T21:51:00.000-07:00

Photos by Dario Ayala

Colore Non Vedenti - Video Diary #1

2008-09-25T21:29:00.000-07:00

Some of you may remember us talking about a short horror film we’re shooting on the Film Junk podcast. Well it’s now underway, and it’s looking to be a much bigger undertaking than we’d expected. The film is called ‘Colore non Vedenti’, and it’s a ‘body snatchers’ type thriller/comedy in the vein of such films as The Stuff, Invaders From Mars and more recently, Slither.

The script is over 30 pages, we’ve got some great actors working in the film (we’ll introduce them on a later diary) and things are going quite good. Ultimately, I made the decision that this isn’t just a Film Junk video. We’re putting a lot of time and energy into this thing and I think it will deserve a little bit more exposure than a week on the front page of Film Junk. Anyways, I’m not entirely sure what the ultimate goal is, but hopefully we’ll have a great end product that you’ll get to check out by the end of the year.

So to start things off, I thought I’d post some video that I shot when me and Roman (producer) went to do a lighting test at the locally infamous ‘Blue Ghost Tunnel’. It’s a pretty creepy place and is a bit out of the way. The main issue here is a lack of power supply. Ultimately, the logistics just didn’t seem to work and the sequence was pretty weak overall, so I cut it. But it’s all a part of the process! Check it out below:

Colore Non Vedenti Production Blog Now Live!

2008-09-25T15:15:00.000-07:00

Friends. Welcome to the official prodcution blog of 'Colore Non Vedenti', a short film written and directed by Jay Cheel. Originally we'd intended on making some video content and production stills available over at Film Junk, but after some thought, we figured it might give us more freedom to post more regularily if we keep a separate blog dedicated to the production of the film. We'll most likely do a weekly update post over at Film Junk just to keep everyone in the loop.

So let the blogging and filmmaking begin! We're already underway, so we'll be doing some catch up with some posts over the next week or so. Keep checking back!