Check the SHORTS SECTION.
New Monster Cops vid.
The Phone Call.
Thursday, February 19, 2009
Tuesday, February 17, 2009
Let the midnight special shine a light on me
The signs are everywhere and I can't ignore them. I've been reminded full force of things from the past and it gives me clarity when working on the future.
Credence Clearwater Revival's classic song "Midnight Special". I listened to it constantly when working on the first Monster Cops script, The Midnight Special.
It was this song and 2 others.
Whodini's Classic of Hip-Hop "The Freaks Come Out at Night"
And the one that really inspired me when working on Monster Cops (and still does to this day): The Hollies classic "Long Cool Woman"
It's these three songs I had put on a repeat over and over the entire time I worked on The Midnight Special. To me these songs captures a strong part of the spirit that is Monster Cops. CCR's Midnight Special had that down home rock and blues tone that you really don't associate too much with horror and monsters. Which is why I found it well suited for Monster Cops. It was the feel of how the Cops operated while under the strain of hunting creatures. Cool and groovy, a tone you wouldn't put with hammering stakes in to Vampire hearts. That's the tone of Monster Cops.
The Freaks Come Out at Night was a song that felt right over images of patrol cars looking for, well, freaks. Cops on patrol, investigating strange situations hunting zombies and ghouls. Like driving through neighborhood streets on Halloween Night, seeing costumed creatures roaming around. Plus it was an old school song that did remind me of that Halloween feel, only because it would always end up on someones Halloween music mixtape along with Thriller, The Halloween Theme, and Attack Of The Killer Tomatoes.
And finally Long Cool Woman was always a favorite of mine. Definitely my fav song from The Hollies and in my top 10 of classic rock songs. This song always felt like great background narration for some undercover cop closing in for the arrest, or DEA agents on a bust. Desipte what it's lyrics may define it as, to me this was the action theme for Monster Cops. The bouncy rock rhythm and feel of CCR's Midnight Special but with a harder edge and faster pace. Rock and Blues for Cops on the move, and that's Monster Cops. Burnt out and blue on the job, cracking jokes about the bust, and all the while the Vampires burn and the Zombie heads explode.
Odd, strange, quirky, funny, and thrilling with monsters and guns thrown in.
All this means that I'm nowhere near done with Monster Cops. There is that specific feel and vision I'm going for and I feel like if I can really nail it, it will really be something great. Not that I wasn't already aiming for that, it's just tonight has been very motivating, and a little inspiring.
Still have many many other videos to work on of course. The video work never goes away, but I do hope to get on the ball with Monster Cops and get as much of my vision out there as possible, more shorts, more episodes, much, much more Monster Cops.
- Patrick
Credence Clearwater Revival's classic song "Midnight Special". I listened to it constantly when working on the first Monster Cops script, The Midnight Special.
It was this song and 2 others.
Whodini's Classic of Hip-Hop "The Freaks Come Out at Night"
And the one that really inspired me when working on Monster Cops (and still does to this day): The Hollies classic "Long Cool Woman"
It's these three songs I had put on a repeat over and over the entire time I worked on The Midnight Special. To me these songs captures a strong part of the spirit that is Monster Cops. CCR's Midnight Special had that down home rock and blues tone that you really don't associate too much with horror and monsters. Which is why I found it well suited for Monster Cops. It was the feel of how the Cops operated while under the strain of hunting creatures. Cool and groovy, a tone you wouldn't put with hammering stakes in to Vampire hearts. That's the tone of Monster Cops.
The Freaks Come Out at Night was a song that felt right over images of patrol cars looking for, well, freaks. Cops on patrol, investigating strange situations hunting zombies and ghouls. Like driving through neighborhood streets on Halloween Night, seeing costumed creatures roaming around. Plus it was an old school song that did remind me of that Halloween feel, only because it would always end up on someones Halloween music mixtape along with Thriller, The Halloween Theme, and Attack Of The Killer Tomatoes.
And finally Long Cool Woman was always a favorite of mine. Definitely my fav song from The Hollies and in my top 10 of classic rock songs. This song always felt like great background narration for some undercover cop closing in for the arrest, or DEA agents on a bust. Desipte what it's lyrics may define it as, to me this was the action theme for Monster Cops. The bouncy rock rhythm and feel of CCR's Midnight Special but with a harder edge and faster pace. Rock and Blues for Cops on the move, and that's Monster Cops. Burnt out and blue on the job, cracking jokes about the bust, and all the while the Vampires burn and the Zombie heads explode.
Odd, strange, quirky, funny, and thrilling with monsters and guns thrown in.
All this means that I'm nowhere near done with Monster Cops. There is that specific feel and vision I'm going for and I feel like if I can really nail it, it will really be something great. Not that I wasn't already aiming for that, it's just tonight has been very motivating, and a little inspiring.
Still have many many other videos to work on of course. The video work never goes away, but I do hope to get on the ball with Monster Cops and get as much of my vision out there as possible, more shorts, more episodes, much, much more Monster Cops.
- Patrick
Friday, February 6, 2009
Zombies Ahead
10:54AM Thursday Feb 05, 2009
Jim Suhr
COLLINSVILLE, Illinois - Pranksters in at least three states are messing with electronic road signs meant to warn motorists of possible traffic problems by putting drivers on notice about Nazi zombies and raptors. And highway safety officials aren't amused.
The latest breach came on Tuesday during the morning rush hour near Collinsville, Illinois, where hackers changed a sign along southbound Interstate 255 to read, "DAILY LANE CLOSURES DUE TO ZOMBIES."
A day earlier in Indiana's Hamilton County, the electronic message on a board in Carmel's construction zone warned drivers of "RAPTORS AHEAD - CAUTION."
And signs in Austin, Texas, recently flashed: "NAZI ZOMBIES! RUN!!!" and "ZOMBIES IN AREA! RUN."
Officials in Illinois are concerned the rewritten signs distract motorists from heeding legitimate hazards down the road. The hacked sign on Tuesday originally warned drivers of crews replacing guardrails.
"We understood it was a hoax, but at the same time those boards are there for a reason," said Joe Gasaway, an Illinois Department of Transportation supervisory field engineer. "We don't want (drivers) being distracted by a funny sign."
Authorities haven't figured out how pranksters access the signs. Gasaway believes the Illinois sign was changed remotely, and Austin Public Works spokeswoman Sara Hartley suspected the hackers there cut a padlock to get into the signs' computers.
Some websites, such as Jalopnik.com, have published tutorials titled "How to Hack an Electronic Road Sign" as a way to alert security holes to traffic-safety officials. Jalopnik urges its readership of 2.6 million a month not to put its lesson to practice.
"Hacking generally is about showing where there are holes in security systems, and I think this is a great example of that," the site's editor-in-chief, Ray Wert, said. "I'm sure there are all sorts of ways to use that information in a way that's inappropriate, but we're trying to make clear this is an issue that needs to be confronted by traffic safety and transportation officials."
Wert said he had no immediate plans to take down Jalopnik's how-to guide.
In Illinois, tampering with an official traffic control device is a misdemeanour punishable by up to a US$250 fine - half what a culprit might have to pay in Texas if caught. If convicted in Indiana, a culprit faces up to a year in jail and $5,000 in fines.
- AP
News Story Link 1
News Story Link 2
Thursday, January 22, 2009
Thursday, January 15, 2009
New Video Blog
New Video blog is up.
http://www.monstercops.com/page.php?page=Vlog
We'll be casting for zombies and vampires soon. so stay tuned for that.
Peace.
- P
http://www.monstercops.com/page.php?page=Vlog
We'll be casting for zombies and vampires soon. so stay tuned for that.
Peace.
- P
Tuesday, January 13, 2009
Still Working It
It was hectic as usual over the holidays, but we managed to get some shooting in for Monster Cops. Coming up I hope to have at least one more full episode and 3 minisodes for your consumption in the next few months. Of course the day job fills in alot of time and there is much commercial work to be done before we can go off and play Monster Cops again. There is a VLOG coming soon to show you what some of us have been up to. Here's a small taste in freeze frame form.
Greenly (Danielle Motley) with a gun. Not that she actually ever holds a gun in any of the episodes, this is actually just Danielle trying to kill Brandon.
AS posted previously, this is a frame from the graphics work for the MKX300 Weapons POV.
Brandon and Chris share a tender moment. What can I say, it's a Bromance.
Danielle tries to remember her lines, as Brandon is in the background ordering a pizza.
Me working on the next prop gun.
More stuff coming soon, so please stay tuned. And thanks to everyone showing us much Monster Cops love, keep those comments and emails coming. We love to read the feedback. You guys rock!
Greenly (Danielle Motley) with a gun. Not that she actually ever holds a gun in any of the episodes, this is actually just Danielle trying to kill Brandon.
AS posted previously, this is a frame from the graphics work for the MKX300 Weapons POV.
Brandon and Chris share a tender moment. What can I say, it's a Bromance.
Danielle tries to remember her lines, as Brandon is in the background ordering a pizza.
Me working on the next prop gun.More stuff coming soon, so please stay tuned. And thanks to everyone showing us much Monster Cops love, keep those comments and emails coming. We love to read the feedback. You guys rock!
Sunday, January 11, 2009
Watch This One Too ....
I cut together another video entry for the Aspire contest to go along with my last "Aliens and Cow Lips" Video. This time I've gotten my fellow Monster Cops involved, Brandon White and Chris Plouffe.
Go to the YouTube page: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JIu9CBaO0Ko
Please spread it around, rate it high, and watch it alot, oh yes and leave a comment.
Go to the YouTube page: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JIu9CBaO0Ko
Please spread it around, rate it high, and watch it alot, oh yes and leave a comment.
Wednesday, January 7, 2009
Help Us Out
This video needs views.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Anq2rVoBLbM
Written, Drawn, Animated, Scored, and Edited by Patrick A. Prejusa.
For Aspire's Netbook Contest. High Ratings, High View Count helps this one win by January 20th. So please check it out and spread it around.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Anq2rVoBLbM
Written, Drawn, Animated, Scored, and Edited by Patrick A. Prejusa.
For Aspire's Netbook Contest. High Ratings, High View Count helps this one win by January 20th. So please check it out and spread it around.
Saturday, November 22, 2008
Visual FX Work
Working on some VFX here's a frame from the POV of the MKX300. Targets scanned and ID'd.
Friday, November 21, 2008
XC20 PROBE CAMERA POV
Visual FX Test. Here we see the POV of the XC20 Umanned Aerial Vehicle. The XC20 is a new prototype camera with Thermal and Nightvision Capability and Onboard Creature Scan. 17 seconds of the XC20 observing Cannibalistic Humanoid Underground Dwellars. 1322-B.
Wednesday, November 19, 2008
Sfumato
For many Sfumato is the Italian term for a painting technique which overlays translucent layers of colour to create perceptions of depth, volume and form.
Sounds like movie making.
Da Vinci himself described sfumato as "without lines or borders, in the manner of smoke or beyond the focus plane"
Certainly this can relate to movie making.
I know the word Sfumato from Michael J. Gelb's book How To Think Like Leonardo DaVinci. There he lists Sfumato as one of Da Vinci's 7 principals. "A Willingness to embrace ambiguity, paradox, and uncertainty."
Now that definitely sounds like movie making to me.
Sfumato, for me, has evolved from just an art technique, into a way of life. To embrace uncertainty. As stated in Gelb's book, to literally go up in smoke. The artistic technique refers to using brush strokes to blend tones together. No harsh lines means a more realistic blend of colors, giving you a better expression of realism. The best example is the Mona Lisa. If we didn't know any better we'd almost think it was a photograph. The paint blended together to recreate reality.
In a way this is what I'm trying to achieve with Monster Cops. It's pretty easy to paint vampires and zombies with harsh lines. Monsters in general lend themselves to a more comic book type world, where the art work can be expressive in it's well defined lines. Just the idea of a Vampire or a Chupacabra does not blend in well with reality. It sticks out, because it's not the norm.
But with Monster Cops I'm trying to blur those lines in order to create a perception of depth. In order to recreate reality. It's practice with each episode, with each shoot. The question always being, how would this play out in reality. If we were REALLY dealing with zombies, vampries, werewolves, etc., how would this secret government agency react? How would we see it on video realistically? What is the most realistic way we can achieve this with the budget we have?
It is practice. It is trial and error. And I'm learning. The first Monster Cops project was The Midnight Special. With it I felt close to the look and feel I wanted, but not really there. With the Shadow Company episode I feel we hit the mark slightly. A good start, but we can do better. I do feel we're on the right track. In the end it is about the essence of your story. What is it we are trying to achieve with Monster Cops? What exactly is that vision?
It's a realistic look into a group of Government Monster Killers. The action, the thrills, and the horror of the investigation and the hunt for creatures of the night, mixed with humor and pathos.
In other words, Cops meets The Office meets Blair Witch meets Monster Squad,
An action, comedy, reality tv show, with realistic depth.
And how do we achieve that depth? How do we blur those lines to recreate reality? By embracing ambiguity, paradox, and uncertainty.
Yup, that's definitely movie making.
Working on the scripts for the next few episodes. Shooting starts back up this Saturday, but with the cold weather, we are relegated to indoor shots. We'll see how it works out. I'm confident we'll have one more episode up before January.
Most likely going to add a cast and crew call page soon.
Ambiguity, paradox, and uncertainty? Where are you guys? Come here, gimme a hug.
Sounds like movie making.
Da Vinci himself described sfumato as "without lines or borders, in the manner of smoke or beyond the focus plane"
Certainly this can relate to movie making.
I know the word Sfumato from Michael J. Gelb's book How To Think Like Leonardo DaVinci. There he lists Sfumato as one of Da Vinci's 7 principals. "A Willingness to embrace ambiguity, paradox, and uncertainty."
Now that definitely sounds like movie making to me.
Sfumato, for me, has evolved from just an art technique, into a way of life. To embrace uncertainty. As stated in Gelb's book, to literally go up in smoke. The artistic technique refers to using brush strokes to blend tones together. No harsh lines means a more realistic blend of colors, giving you a better expression of realism. The best example is the Mona Lisa. If we didn't know any better we'd almost think it was a photograph. The paint blended together to recreate reality.
In a way this is what I'm trying to achieve with Monster Cops. It's pretty easy to paint vampires and zombies with harsh lines. Monsters in general lend themselves to a more comic book type world, where the art work can be expressive in it's well defined lines. Just the idea of a Vampire or a Chupacabra does not blend in well with reality. It sticks out, because it's not the norm.
But with Monster Cops I'm trying to blur those lines in order to create a perception of depth. In order to recreate reality. It's practice with each episode, with each shoot. The question always being, how would this play out in reality. If we were REALLY dealing with zombies, vampries, werewolves, etc., how would this secret government agency react? How would we see it on video realistically? What is the most realistic way we can achieve this with the budget we have?
It is practice. It is trial and error. And I'm learning. The first Monster Cops project was The Midnight Special. With it I felt close to the look and feel I wanted, but not really there. With the Shadow Company episode I feel we hit the mark slightly. A good start, but we can do better. I do feel we're on the right track. In the end it is about the essence of your story. What is it we are trying to achieve with Monster Cops? What exactly is that vision?
It's a realistic look into a group of Government Monster Killers. The action, the thrills, and the horror of the investigation and the hunt for creatures of the night, mixed with humor and pathos.
In other words, Cops meets The Office meets Blair Witch meets Monster Squad,
An action, comedy, reality tv show, with realistic depth.
And how do we achieve that depth? How do we blur those lines to recreate reality? By embracing ambiguity, paradox, and uncertainty.
Yup, that's definitely movie making.
Working on the scripts for the next few episodes. Shooting starts back up this Saturday, but with the cold weather, we are relegated to indoor shots. We'll see how it works out. I'm confident we'll have one more episode up before January.
Most likely going to add a cast and crew call page soon.
Ambiguity, paradox, and uncertainty? Where are you guys? Come here, gimme a hug.
Saturday, November 15, 2008
Saturday, November 1, 2008
Shadow Company Episode is Live!!!
The 24 minute episode, MONSTER COPS: SHADOW COMPANY is now ONLINE for all to see. Check it out at Monstercops.comCLICK HERE TO WATCH THE EPISODE NOW!
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