The last few weeks have been incredibly busy for me both personally and professionally. I am managing to steal a few minutes to catch my breath and update you on what is going on. In my last entry, I mentioned that I re-connected with an old friend who started up another visual effects company with foreign investors as partners. The company will be based in San Francisco and as well as India (which seems to be the trend in VFX these days) with the SF offices acting as the hub of the company. He’s been great about bringing me onboard and allowing me to maintain an office in Burbank! As of today, we are waiting for our funding to be completely in place so we can finalize the rest of our build out. It has been slow moving and frustrating at times but I can’t complain, I’m getting paid and I wrote a business plan for our investors, my first ever and it came out really well!! We are hoping the banks will finally approve the loan and we’ll be up and running shortly! The downtime has made me feel a little lethargic and out of touch with the business but then I hear from friends that things are slow out there, which I guess helps ease my guilty feelings! =)
On a more personal front, I am crazily getting ready for my upcoming wedding!! Yes, I know it’s all happening so fast since we just got engaged at the end of last year but we figured, why wait? We’re living together and practically married, all we need is to make it official. So we’re off to Maui in April to have a quiet and beautiful ceremony on the beach! Ahhhhhh.. can’t wait! Then we are throwing a party/reception two weeks later to celebrate with family and friends. It’s creeping up on me quickly. We found a great place for the party, ordered the invitations and just hired a DJ. Phew my list is getting shorter.. slowly!
Wednesday, February 18, 2009
Wednesday, February 11, 2009
Any Day Now
Well, it's been a busy few weeks. As I mentioned last time, my second child is due very soon. I actually thought I might already have him by the time I wrote this post. For various medical reasons, I will probably have the baby in the next few days, so we're now just waiting for his arrival. It's all very exciting. The past two weeks have been busy getting everything in order, packing our bags for the hospital, going to doctor's appointments, etc.
It's also been the final few weeks for me to take care of work before I take a few weeks off. Just barely in time, my partner and I received the first draft of the script on one of our projects. The writer has done a fantastic job. We've spent the last week reading and doing notes, then we had a series of 3 marathon notes sessions, both alone and with the writer. These lasted about 8 hours each day, but they were such productive meetings. We've finally sent the writer off to work on the second draft of the script. He'll have a few weeks of work before giving it back to us for another round of notes. You never know what to expect when the first draft comes in. Sometimes there's so much work to be done, it's impossible to know where to start. Other times, the writer gives you so much to work with, it's a pleasure to jump in and make those changes necessary to make it a movie. Although time consuming, it's been a fantastic process on this one.
We're continuing with the usual on our other projects--checking in with writers who are working, meeting with studio executives, looking for writers on a new project, among many other things that I won't get into here.
At home, my two year old daughter is so excited to become a big sister. We've been busy trying to get her registered for preschool next fall and putting together Valentine's cards for her class. Our dog, a boxer named Winston, is wondering what's going on, but he's a good sport about the whole thing.
I'm keeping this short, as there are quite a few things to do as we get ready to potentially have our baby tomorrow. I'm actually jumping on a conference call for work right now before finishing up everything else.
More soon...
It's also been the final few weeks for me to take care of work before I take a few weeks off. Just barely in time, my partner and I received the first draft of the script on one of our projects. The writer has done a fantastic job. We've spent the last week reading and doing notes, then we had a series of 3 marathon notes sessions, both alone and with the writer. These lasted about 8 hours each day, but they were such productive meetings. We've finally sent the writer off to work on the second draft of the script. He'll have a few weeks of work before giving it back to us for another round of notes. You never know what to expect when the first draft comes in. Sometimes there's so much work to be done, it's impossible to know where to start. Other times, the writer gives you so much to work with, it's a pleasure to jump in and make those changes necessary to make it a movie. Although time consuming, it's been a fantastic process on this one.
We're continuing with the usual on our other projects--checking in with writers who are working, meeting with studio executives, looking for writers on a new project, among many other things that I won't get into here.
At home, my two year old daughter is so excited to become a big sister. We've been busy trying to get her registered for preschool next fall and putting together Valentine's cards for her class. Our dog, a boxer named Winston, is wondering what's going on, but he's a good sport about the whole thing.
I'm keeping this short, as there are quite a few things to do as we get ready to potentially have our baby tomorrow. I'm actually jumping on a conference call for work right now before finishing up everything else.
More soon...
Ray Harryhausen, Grand Guru
Since my last posting, I’ve been to London and Paris, and am now home again. As with most of my trips to London, I’ve flown back with a nasty cold. It’s hard to escape since most everywhere you go in London, people seem to be coughing and hacking. I face each trip to London now with a mix of dread and worry for the inevitable cold I’m about to catch. (Yes, I’ve tried vitamins, Zicam, Airborne and Emergen-C).
Every few trips to London, my partner and I try to pay a visit to his childhood hero and inspiration, Ray Harryhausen. For thousands of visual effects artists, Ray Harryhausen’s work was the creative inspiration that got them into filmmaking. Ray influenced a generation of directors (among them Tim Burton, John Landis, Peter Jackson) and VFX Supervisors (Dennis Muren, Phil Tippett, Ken Ralston, just to name a few) with the fantastical worlds he created. At age 88, he still travels, writes books, goes on speaking tours to meet the legions of his fans around the world, and performs the role of emeritus effects guru.
I hate to admit that until I worked in visual effects, I had never heard of him. My film school education did not cover his brilliant work as most of his movies were not usually part of film school canon. Also, I was not a little girl who watched sci-fi or monster films. Without the benefit of having brothers or boy cousins, my exposure to Ray’s films were nil. So it wasn’t until a few years ago that I came to appreciate and admire the talents of this animation genius.
What is especially astounding is that Ray worked alone. All those frames of beautiful stop-motion were animated by his two hands. These days, it takes a team of 300 people to do what Ray did alone. So much for computers taking jobs away from humans! Ray built the armatures, sculpted, animated, lit and shot the models, while supervising the live action to work with his effects. Equal parts artist and technician, he also managed his own budget, thus adding VFX producer responsibilities to all of his other duties. So to call him a “guru” seems to be an understatement.
Ray seems amused by what the VFX field has become since the advent of computer technology. He’s also seen the landscape of filmmaking change drastically over the past five decades. A couple of hours with Ray, and I am graced with stories about what it was like to work with Bernie (that’s Bernard Herrmann to you and me), his experience shooting on location in The Alhambra in Granada, Spain (perhaps the last film production allowed within the citadel) and funny quips that illuminate what has (but also hasn’t) changed about the business. He is a living film history. As with all great professors, Ray is generous in sharing his passion and knowledge. I gain in two hours with Ray, what can be a whole semester’s worth of film history class. University Harryhausen is my favorite place in London.
As I’ve stated in an earlier blog, I never felt that my true calling was to work in visual effects. However, I am ever grateful for the detour. I’ve had a chance to work with some fantastically talented people who are passionate about their work. More importantly, I met the man who inspired them, the Grand Guru himself.
P.S. You can view highlights of Ray Harryhausen's work on YouTube.com.
Every few trips to London, my partner and I try to pay a visit to his childhood hero and inspiration, Ray Harryhausen. For thousands of visual effects artists, Ray Harryhausen’s work was the creative inspiration that got them into filmmaking. Ray influenced a generation of directors (among them Tim Burton, John Landis, Peter Jackson) and VFX Supervisors (Dennis Muren, Phil Tippett, Ken Ralston, just to name a few) with the fantastical worlds he created. At age 88, he still travels, writes books, goes on speaking tours to meet the legions of his fans around the world, and performs the role of emeritus effects guru.
I hate to admit that until I worked in visual effects, I had never heard of him. My film school education did not cover his brilliant work as most of his movies were not usually part of film school canon. Also, I was not a little girl who watched sci-fi or monster films. Without the benefit of having brothers or boy cousins, my exposure to Ray’s films were nil. So it wasn’t until a few years ago that I came to appreciate and admire the talents of this animation genius.
What is especially astounding is that Ray worked alone. All those frames of beautiful stop-motion were animated by his two hands. These days, it takes a team of 300 people to do what Ray did alone. So much for computers taking jobs away from humans! Ray built the armatures, sculpted, animated, lit and shot the models, while supervising the live action to work with his effects. Equal parts artist and technician, he also managed his own budget, thus adding VFX producer responsibilities to all of his other duties. So to call him a “guru” seems to be an understatement.
Ray seems amused by what the VFX field has become since the advent of computer technology. He’s also seen the landscape of filmmaking change drastically over the past five decades. A couple of hours with Ray, and I am graced with stories about what it was like to work with Bernie (that’s Bernard Herrmann to you and me), his experience shooting on location in The Alhambra in Granada, Spain (perhaps the last film production allowed within the citadel) and funny quips that illuminate what has (but also hasn’t) changed about the business. He is a living film history. As with all great professors, Ray is generous in sharing his passion and knowledge. I gain in two hours with Ray, what can be a whole semester’s worth of film history class. University Harryhausen is my favorite place in London.
As I’ve stated in an earlier blog, I never felt that my true calling was to work in visual effects. However, I am ever grateful for the detour. I’ve had a chance to work with some fantastically talented people who are passionate about their work. More importantly, I met the man who inspired them, the Grand Guru himself.
P.S. You can view highlights of Ray Harryhausen's work on YouTube.com.
Subscribe to:
Comments (Atom)