Dude Who Makes Movies

Pixel Corps Challenge

Priest's Awakening is being worked on harder than ever in the Pixel Corps.  Soon a new "challenge" will be posted about a particular series of effects for the movie.  A "challenge" in the Pixel Corps is a judged, and timed competition of sorts between guild members who wish to work on the piece.  The winner receives a prize, and in this case, their name in the credits also (most likely, depending on how good things turn out). 
The shot itself is where the main actor is on the virtual set. This is a picture of the greenscreen footage that will need to be composited onto the virtual set eventually.  Here's the rough concept of the virtual set.  The drawings were done by Matt Elser of Fairfield, and the 3D rendering was done by Vince Bauer of New York.    Link to 3D rendering:  Virtual Set

Here are some rough draft textured stills of the virtual set, by Vince Bauer.  In this scene, the main character Priest (his name is Priest) encounters a demon.  Concept art by Matt Elser, 3D rendering (untextured) by Brandon Sweatman from Fairfield, CA.

It's all coming together.  What amazes me is that there is so much talent in Fairfield.

Mova and the future of movies.

I've made friends with the Motion Capture Supervisor of Mova (www.mova.com) Greg LaSalle over the past couple years, and I'm always amazed at what they are doing.

They were featured in a hilarious show called "How William Shatner Changed the World".  It's actually interesting story.

I used to be manager of the soundstage/greenscreen and Mac labs at the San Francisco School of Digital Filmmaking (www.sfdigifilm.com).  I would commute every day, pay the tolls, burn the gas, increase my capacity to forgive due to heavy traffic, then pull up and park in the back of the old industrial complex I would park next to then walk to work.  I would walk up to the building through the gates, up the loading dock steps, then take the silver elevator up, past the San Francisco Art Institute, to the third floor.  Every day I would wave to the elevator camera.  I always wave when someone stares at me.  Then upon completion of the lift, I would wait for the doors to open, then walk past the two yellow cement polls, down the long and tall hallway, backlit by high industrial windows, past several unknown businesses, and then walk into work.  After work I would then reverse this process and go home.

Upon arriving at home one night, I went inside, grabbed a bite to eat, and began watching "How William Shatner Changed the World".  The narrator was talking about all the cool technology based off of Star Trek, and I was thinking, "eh, cool, nothing else is on".  I was nearly finished, and something I saw made me stop mid-chew.  Dish TV allows me to rewind a live feed.  I rewound.  The narrator was in a strikingly familiar elevator.  Upon beginning his lines, he walked past a pair of extremely familiar yellow poles as well, and then after a fairly long interlude, arrived at the door I had always been curious about myself.  The door said Mova.

At this point, even though it was the exact hallway I had walked down every day for about a year, I had to rewind a couple times to make sure.  Sure enough it was the same hallway.  Watch "How William Shatner Changed the World" to see how it ends, it was a good show.

But for me, I had a brand new adventure waiting ahead--  I was going to make some new friends.  And I did.  The next day of work, I knocked lightly on the door, with no reply.  So, I just opened the door and entered.  There were a few computer geeks there doing amazing things that I had absolutely no clue about, and a man named Greg came up and greeted me.  I said I was simply poking my head in as a student filmmaker and neighbor, their door was directly across from mine at the school.  He showed me around.  They had an awesome motion capture studio set up, and I had no idea it was there.

I visited more in the future.  The last time I went, a couple months ago, I took my business partner Dave, his wife Brenda, and my fiance Julia.  The door was closed again, and the girls were very nervous.  They didn't want to just open the door without at least knocking.  I opened it and found Greg.  Dave followed, the girls waited in the hallway.  Greg was very anxious to tell me about a new technology they discovered and were perfecting.  It's called Contour Reality Capture.

A little bit of science will need to be understood to understand how it works.  I'll attempt to explain the best I can.  Basically, they use phosphorescent makeup, in other words, "glow in the dark" makeup, which they paint on the surface of whatever it is they are going to capture, such as a human face.  They use specialized lights and cameras to capture the movements of the face and a computer converts it into digital form.  Previously the technique was to do something like photogrammetry, which I have done for my short movie Priest's Awakening (real actor has dots, the digital model doesn't have eyes), which is a series of dots on the actors face which are used to triangulate the shape, which is then fudged by an artist, at which point, a digital version of the face is stored which is then manually animated by another artist.  It takes a lot longer to do that, and the results are "iffy" at best.  The Contour system captures moving surfaces down to an extremely high level of detail, which means, the exact surface and exact motion of the skin is digitized, which means there is no need to waste time trying to make an artistic rendition of the actor.  Instead, the exact surface is captured.  Watch these to learn more.

http://www.mova.com/movies/Steve_Perlman_Contour_Briefing-480p.qtl
http://www.mova.com/movies/Steve_Perlman_Contour_Briefing-medium.wmv

The point is, technology is awesome.  I love this stuff, and I feel totally blessed to be around people who do stuff like this.  The future of movies is going to be amazing.

Here's to the future,

Josh Harris

No Ambition's first partial cast meeting.

I met with the main four actors who will be in my first feature No Ambition.  Travis Straw, Kai Straw, Kyle McCarthy and Josh Dacus.  It was a good start to a very promising movie, in my opinion.  We were able to chat about the production plans and possible budgetary needs and go over the story together.  The strangest thing happened.  I realized I was sitting in the room with the characters I had created and written about for so long.

I don't think I could have cast it much better even with a huge budget.  Specifically, when I started tossing out small quirks and dabs of information about the characters each actor was going to play, they all said they already do that in real life anyway.  I am not one to type-cast, but apparently I saw that these guys already were the characters so I couldn't help but give them the parts.  For example, I was going on about how Dustin, to be played by Travis Straw, is someone who is very loose, and a little offbeat, the type to wear moccasins around town.  Also, Eric, to be played by Kai Straw, is supposed to be a former nerd who wears tight clothing and brand name shoes to compensate.  Noah, to be played by Kyle McCarthy, is supposed to be a former trench coat type, little bit crazy type who is a complete jerk.  And Gilbert, to be played by Josh Dacus, is a D&D nerd who consults a D20 in real life situations.  A D20 is a twenty sided die which is used in role playing games such as Dungeons and Dragons.

The point is, all the actors pretty much are their characters already.  I had the idea of using a D20 to consult every day situations for Gilbert in the script a LONG time ago.  Last night, the first meeting with Josh Dacus, one of the first things he asked was whether or not it would be ok if his character could consult a D20 at some point in the script.  I thought he was joking, meaning, I thought he already knew somehow that it was in the script, but he really had no clue.  I don't think anyone else in the world could have asked that, because Josh Dacus is Gilbert.  Not to mention that Travis DOES where moccasins, Kai is a former nerd (him and Josh Dacus talked about translating the entire Lord of the Rings trilogy into Elvin a few years ago) who wears trendy clothing now, and Kyle works at a paintball store and is a little bit too happy about violence.

It's a great feeling as a filmmaker to see actors who will do your characters justice.  Especially since I am writing the script along with directing it.  I will need to have guys who can carry their own load and become their character because that will free me up to judge how "true" each scene is.  What that means to me is, making sure they portray the story accurately, and they stay in the moment.  There are a lot of opinions and styles of directing, but mine, I believe, will be more laid back.  I am a fan of improv, so I want to practice enough with the cast to get them comfortable enough to make decisions, while in the moment, that might not be in the script.  As long as they are in character and in the moment, almost any improv will be usable and correct.

That's why I'm so excited.  These guys are going to do an amazing job as these characters.  They all have a great sense of humor, and have experience acting on camera.  My main goal will be to get them used to production on a larger scale.  I won't have a huge movie crew, but it will be bigger than making movies with a few friends.  Once that is out of the way, the sky is the limit as far as potential.

It was all very exciting and I can't wait to meet with them again.

The next order of business for No Ambition is to continue to work on the script.  It's not unusual at all for a script to be worked on even while the movie is being shot.  It has to do with being practical about money.  I can't have a million dollar chase sequence in my movie, unless someone gives me a million dollars.  So, I am continuing to write and edit based off of what comes up.  The story is written, but the way I am going to tell it may change depending on what resources are available.

Also, I am going to hold auditions soon, especially for the part of Megan.  Megan is the last major character that needs to be cast.  So far, I haven't found anyone that really suits the part.  I will post details on that at a later date.

I am very glad to share this with you all, and stay tuned for more updates.  If you're interested in getting involved, email me at [email protected] .

Thanks

Josh

Save your money.

I have a very strong intuition.  I don't know why.  Maybe it's all the news about the markets and housing.  Maybe it's all the spending on the wars.  Maybe it's because the dollar is dying slowly.  Maybe it's because Americans save NEGATIVE money.  That means, Americans SPEND more than they make.  I have been growing more and more concerned as time goes on.

I know I'm just a filmmaker, and I don't know much about the economy in reality, but for some reason I have a very strong intuition that something big and bad is coming.  Although, I feel that if people my age (I'm 26), would be a little wiser about their finances, then America could be saved.  I think the dollar is a promise.  The dollar is a promise of responsibility with finances; a guarantee that our government, which represents us, the People, will make good on all things we spend money on.

Personally, I don't think our current spending policies are sustainable.  I have a feeling it's much like in physics, as you approach the speed of light, you start becoming infinitely massive, therefore much harder to move (learned that from Mr. Gelpke at Fairfield High).  You can't expect to continue growing an economy so insanely fast and not have a time where it slows down massively.  I call it feast and famine.

There will be times when we as Americans can feast, and Americans feast well, but there will be times when there will be famine.  In all honesty, I don't know how well Americans would do with famine.  For the most part, Americans my age seem to be very used to having everything they need almost at any time they want.  Food, shelter, security, it seems to be a fairly common standard in America.  Of course it's not true for everyone, but only a small percentage go without, and for those who lack food, shelter and security, it is usually only very temporary and not enough to kill them (as it is in other nations quite often).

Americans NEED to be wiser with money.  It's so very important to the world in my opinion.  If our economy tanks, then we are basically powerless in the world.  And if America is no longer in power, then what is going to fill that vacuum?  I don't really want to think about that.  Personally, not that this will be the answer to everything in the world, but if people were wiser with their money, and had an attitude of humility about what they actually need in life, then much of the world would be better off.  I have to admit, thinking about all this has definitely grown my respect for the generation who went through the Great Depression.  Frankly, I wouldn't be surprised if it wasn't the frugal attitudes of that generation that helped spark the post-war economic boom after WWII.

I know of several people, one of them being Pat Stonsby who lives in Fairfield, in her 70s, who still save and collect various containers, and who never throw away leftover food.  I think part of me really respects that.  I know that in my own life, it's been a very common thing to throw away food that I know I just spend a lot of money on because I couldn't finish it.  Not to mention that I throw away bottles and cans all the time.

I think wisdom in finances is key for another reason too, and this might sound a little too scary to people, and maybe a little crazy to others.  Personally, I think the rise of the credit score monster is a new and scary occurrence.  New meaning, the last few decades.  Since when does a three-digit number determine whether or not you can buy a house or not?  What the crap is with that?  Since when does someone keeping track of your financial reputation, whether it is accurate or not, matter so much?  I don't think such surveillance ever existed before now.   Since when can't we buy, sell or trade without this stupid mark...

To me, credit is another form of slavery.  I call it "in-debt-ured" servants.  We enter into a contract with a financial institution, at which point, we are forced to spend our money, which we receive in exchange for whatever work we do, on paying the financial institutions back.  Essentially, we work to pay back what we owe financial institutions, and we don't have much choice.  Why?  Because everything is so expensive, and we don't have a choice but to copy everyone else and take on a bunch of debt in order to make a living.  And if we don't pay, the credit demons will get you.

That's why we as Americans need to live within our means.  We can't be so stupid.  Frankly, it's shameful, and our own ridiculous ways will lead to our destruction if we don't start getting smart.  We need to do what we can to save money while we can.  I'm talking to myself to.  As someone who has failed to save anything substantial, I need to do this just as bad as anyone else.  But as a whole, Americans can't seem to hold onto money for long at all.  This needs to change.  We need to start living like money is actually worth something, and therefore, worth holding onto.

So, how do we live in a world of credit without using it?  I don't know yet.  I haven't been able to do that since I went to college in San Diego.  I would love to find out, believe me.  I love old used cars, and spending cash on anything feels great.  I know it's not completely practical in this world, especially if you intend to buy a house, but I would love to learn how to operate in this world without credit.  I would feel so free.  I suppose I need to save as much money as I possibly can.

You never know when the next famine is going to hit.

Josh

Content

I have to leave for San Francisco in about two and a half hours, which typically costs me about $15 to get there and back every day, and I hate the commute, but I love why I'm going there.  As I sit in my bed with the laptop on my lap, typing and thinking, I can't help but be reminded of how content I really am.

I can't think of another time in my life when I have been so happy and eager to work.  God has seriously blessed me, and you may not believe that, but that's ok, because I know I need to give God credit first for my own sake.  But anyways, I remember being in school, like being at Dover Middle School and pretty much hating it.  The only thing that got me through that was my involvement in music.  Then I went to Fairfield High School and was a member of the Scarlet Brigade there, but then I realized I didn't like that either.  I had nothing in common with the people and I hated marching.  But I still, theoretically, did it for the love of music.  I think mostly, I was afraid to try anything else because everything else seemed so horrible.

But, I quit band abruptly after enduring too much ridiculousness, and tried theater.  I did enjoy it a lot, and so my senior year I was in a play called "Fortune's Chance: From the Earth to the Moon".  I had three parts and I enjoyed the idea of pretending to be someone you weren't, and the creative aspect of stage design and blocking.  Theater was closer to something I wanted to do, but that wasn't enough to convince me.

So I went to college for about a year and a half at a private university called Point Loma, which turned out to be a colossal waste of my time and more importantly my money.  It's about $25,000 a semester, which was mostly covered by my scholarships, until they decided to change the rules about that (until they got sued and were forced to change the rules back AFTER I left).  I was one of two people who enrolled in their "music-business" program, and the person was from Fairfield too.  However, that person left the school, and I remained as the sole Music-Business major at Point Loma until a day two after when my adviser broke the news that they were dissolving my major.  I was real happy with that...

So I left.  I was already angry and frustrated enough as a struggling artist, so my brain just zapped.  I came home and just sat in my room for about a year (not literally, I went out to eat and possibly shower).  I was in a deep depression.  I think I needed a while to "find myself".

So, after a while I went back to college at Los Medanos down in Pittsburg, CA, and took more music-business classes.  These were real music-business classes.  At Point Loma, I would compare the classes to this:  for Marine-biology, they would have taught courses about the Marines, and about cellular structures, not about sea turtles and the ocean.  At Point Loma I was being taught music theory, and accounting, and nothing about contracts and record label deals.  But at Los Medanos, I got the real deal.

And I hated it.  I realized that record producers are complete scum, usually.  They treat artists like objects, and force them to change whatever it takes about themselves to turn a profit.  I was really shocked that I hated it so much.  I still loved music, but I realized that being some huge rock star wasn't for me, at least not that way.  It would be a miracle at this point because I don't trust producers.

At that point, I was in a brand new world.  It was deeply disappointing, like a standing in a pasture after a fire, but then again I could see some potential life for the future springing up.  I decided to go to school at Solano part time so that I could defer my loans.  I didn't care about learning, I just didn't want to pay off loans to Point Loma because I hated the school for screwing me over.  But anyways, I decided to take a screenplay writing course for fun because it was at the time and day I wanted to go to school.

I was a little apprehensive because as far as I could remember all my English teachers hated me.  If any of you out their were my fellow students who are reading this blog, I'm sure you could attest to that.  Sigh.  Well, the fact is, I thought they were illogical hormonally challenged hippies anyway.  Hehe.  How's that for a blanket opinion?  I remember one teacher, Mrs. Mclelland at Dover M.S. who told me I had great potential as a writer, and that is the entirety of the encouragement I have ever received from an English teacher.  But writing screenplays is different, I thought to myself, I could handle this.

So I took the class and I was fascinated by the whole thing.  I loved the idea of "story".  I didn't know I would want to end up being a filmmaker until much later however.  I took the film courses at Solano College several times until I couldn't get credit for them anymore, but I learned enough to get me interested in learning more.  But Solano College wasn't enough for me.  In fact, most academic institutions wouldn't have been enough for me at that point.  I needed a school that would actually teach me exactly how to make a movie in today's world, not teach me the history of how the industry got to where it is today, or the theory behind shooting and writing a movie.  Show me (what can I say, I was born in Missouri).

It took me a while, and I almost went to USC, but I remembered that I hated the glitz and glamor of Hollywood, until my buddy Dave told me about a new school being started out in San Francisco called the San Francisco School of Digital Filmmaking, www.sfdigifilm.com .  At first I thought, what is it like some sort of video school where they teach you how to make corporate training videos?  But upon my first visit, seeing the big greenscreen and all the equipment, I realized that I had to go to this school.

I decided to take out another loan and start courses there in Spring of 2005 and I haven't regretted it since.  I graduated last year after being there about 40-60 hours a week, every week.  I don't think I could have learned more in such a short period of time about filmmaking.  I really can't think of anywhere else someone will take the time to teach you, all the while forcing you to use the equipment and make some movies.  It's totally awesome.

Over the course of 2004 and early 2005, before I started school, I, and my friends Dave and Ryan, wanted to do a story about something cool.  That something mutated from vampires to werewolves, but I really didn't like the idea of doing yet another movie about vampires and werewolves, so eventually the notion of angels and demons came up, and I had an epiphany.  I started writing various ideas and permutations for angel characters, but finally I decided that it needed to be a human story.  Angel characters are very cool and interesting, but without a human perspective, it would all seem a little out there.  So I came up with a character named Priest.  He isn't a priest, he was named such as a tribute to a past where individual freedom was standard, unlike the oppressive world he lives in.  The catch is, Priest can see angels and demons, so he thinks.  In fact Priest doesn't know what to think.  Sometimes he thinks he's going crazy.

The point is, as my senior thesis, I was able to shoot a small portion of my angels and demons story, which has three full features planned mind you, and I have been incredibly lucky, which I call blessed, because I have had so much amazing material created for the movie.  I will have a post with pictures sometime soon.  It was a highly ambitious student short, and I think people have really responded to the level of excellence I require, and I really appreciate that.

But the point of ALL of this is this:  I am content.  I am happy to be struggling and unhappy with where I am now.  I am happy to be working hard on making something of myself.  I am happy to be blessed with the stuff that has been done already.  Even though I have failed numerous times, I am content in what I am doing, and it's a great feeling.  There is nothing better than allowing God to help you find your purpose in life.  How did God do that?  That will be another post too.

Anyways, I have to go now.  I need to get ready to go shoot today.

Later,

Josh Harris

So it was sunny the day I took pictures, and I decided to take a bunch, but I'm only going to show a few.  The location up in Windsor, CA was beautiful once the rain stopped.

That day we moved inside after mostly exterior shots and I took a couple snap shots off.

Overall the shoot was productive although we fell behind several days, but that isn't unusual when it comes to shooting features.  It was a great experience working directly with the director and director of photography to see how other people make films.  Celik Kayalar was the director (on the left) and Sam Chase was the director of photography (on the right).

I still have two more days to go but after that I will be able to start working on my own stuff again, which will be great.  I have a couple features I need to read over from Kendall Davis and Isaac Escobedo, then I need to finish up my final draft of "No Ambition" so I can start some more serious pre-production on it.  Again, October is EXTREMELY busy.

But I love this stuff!

Josh

Back from Windsor, CA

I love shooting movies.  I was 2nd AD on this particular set, which is 2nd assistant director.  This is going to be my first feature film credit, so that's not too shabby.  Not many people start off assistant directing, so I'm pleased.  Of course, I am a director ultimately anyway so everything came very natural to me.  I had no problem bossing people around and sweet talking "the talent" and dealing with all of the other opinionated filmmaker wannabes on the set.  Fun stuff.  I'm living the dream.

I go back next week to finish out the movie, and I might have to go back the week after to pick up some extra shots.  So far the footage looks great.  I'll post some pictures up tomorrow, right now I need sleep because I have a long day tomorrow.

Josh Harris

Preparing to go on location.

Motel or cabin floor?  I have to make a choice.  What does that mean?  Well, in this case, a motel means a soft bed, my own hot shower, HBO and CNN, my own locking door and keycard, and a nice private place to flop and snore in.  The cabin floor is $250 cheaper, also known as free, where a lot of the other crew is going to sleep, where I can prove my dedication to the film by remaining intimately attached to the set itself (well, the floor of the room, in the cabin, in my sleeping bag), wait in line for a shower (if I get one), and did I mention it's free?

Yeah, on top of that, I'm looking into getting a way used BMW for Julia.  You guessed it, it's about the same price as getting a motel for the week.  You might not believe me but it runs and the engine has good compression.  Sure it's got a ton of other things wrong with it, but that's what money is for right?  In case you're wondering, it's a 1987 BMW 735i.  So I suppose that could influence my decision.

On top of that I have snoring anxiety.  I just made that up, but essentially it's the fear of either snoring to loud and keeping others awake, and I do snore, or that someone else will snore louder than me and keep me awake.  I don't know if I mentioned that joining me on the floor of the cabin, in their own sleeping bags, are about 10 other people in the crew, who will remain nameless, not because I want to protect their identity, but because I literally have never met them.  Whee.  Reminds me of summer camp.  So that's another thing that could influence my decision.

I'm also way busy with my church trying to get it ready for the Oct. 21st start date for our new venue.  Because of my experience being in charge of the stage at www.sfdigifilm.com, I have pretty much been alone in getting a lot of it done.  Of course, I have had some help, but right now, literally, I came over to take a quick break from being up in the rafters working on stage lighting and write a quick blog while I could.  In fact, I should leave here in about 5 minutes.

But before that, I would like to say that overall, despite the stress I feel, I am very excited to be a part of "Moonlight Sonata".  I am always excited to make movies, mostly because I can't think of any other job I would rather have.  It's the only job that includes almost all other art forms, that's what I always think about.  Plus it's a chance to learn a lot about how feature films are made, and what I learn there will only make me a better filmmaker and prepare me for my own career.

So, I think, in light of my own career, I should saturate myself with this film, sleeping on the floor, learning from everyone I can, and since Julia is going to need a car to get to school and work when we are married, I'll buy that BMW instead of a warm bed at a motel for a week, and I'll get to know my sleeping bag again after about 10 years, which should be interesting olfactorily, and at the end of the last day of the week, and even though I might worry about snoring and lack of sleep, I will man through it and emerge victorious through sheer will power. 

That and some foam ear plugs.

Josh

P.S.  I'll take pictures this week and see what I can show next week.

No Ambition: For Solano by Solano.

No Ambition.  What is it?  Well, first of all it's the name of an old local punk band I believe.  Did they inspire the name?  Could be.  But ultimately, it's the name of my first feature length movie.  It's about myself and my friends who have lived here for so long.  It's about the middle class suburban plight.  It's about a couple dudes who have dreams to make epic movies but just sit around playing Xbox instead of doing anything constructive.  It's about love and death, sort of.  It's about comic books (Waterfront Comics in Suisun to be exact).  It's about the love-hate relationships people in the area have with each other, like being stuck on a life raft together.  It's also about how everyone who lives here claims to hate it here, but whenever they visit somewhere else, they're glad they don't live there.  It's about Solano county.

Why did I choose such a fascinatingly mundane subject?  Because I wanted to show what Solano can do.  I am from Solano, but I haven't always lived here.  I have the luxury of coming from out of state, from less quality locations where less talented and able people live, so living here has been very good to me.  There is a lot of local talent here, which is why I am starting off my feature career in the area.  I could probably simply go down to L.A. and start working on features down there, or possibly even just start working on features in S.F., but I don't want to go somewhere far away and pretend I fit in.  Sure I might be able to function, but personally, I think I would just be working against who I am and where I came from.

The fact is, 99.9% of people shoot for the  BIG target that is way off in the distance and fail to hit a bullseye, or even hit the target at all.  But, the best of the best create smaller targets around themselves and hit the bullseye every time.  In fact, I formed this philosophy based off of something George Martin said.  George Martin took a little band of talented and witty young men who called themselves the Beatles and created superstars, despite thinking they were "rather unpromising" at first.

So, I've decided to fill out the cast and crew with the talented people of Solano as much as I possibly can.  Right now, my buddy Isaac Escobedo has agreed to help out where he can (I will probably give him a producer credit or something), and I have found my lead actor to play "Dustin Broderick", the main character, and his name is Travis Straw.  Travis is a hilarious local actor and filmmaker who studied with George Maguire out at Solano College.  He is currently a manager at Edward's theater where he is surrounded by movies every day.  He is something special, I would have had a very hard time finding someone like him even if I had post a casting call on the various casting websites that blanket the bay area.  I am very excited to work with him.  In addition, his friend Kyle McCarthy is billed to play "Noah Gabriel", the witty, sarcastic loser genius.  I am currently looking to some more roles and I intend to have a casting call sometime soon, but for now, the most important thing I want to point out is that myself, Isaac, Travis and Noah are all from Solano county.

My ultimate intention is to shoot the entire movie in Solano county and then show it to the people of Solano.  I already have verbal agreements with the owners of Waterfront Comics and Uncle Bong's Pizzeria to shoot in their businesses and include them into the script.  Real life locations are awesome.  I intend to shoot in other unique locations in the area somehow or another, such as somewhere in Cement Hill in order to illustrate how Fairfield/Suisun got it's start, possibly at Travis AFB, downtown Fairfield, Suisun, and Vacaville, and some other unique locations around the county.  I would love to get it into local theaters and have an official premiere party, you know, do movies Solano style.  Who needs Hollywood?

If you're interested in helping in some way or another email me [email protected] .  No Ambition is going to be straight up fun to shoot.

Josh Harris

Busy October

So I'm going to be 2nd AD for two weeks on a feature based out of SF.  I'll be on location from Oct. 15th-20th, so I won't have time for updates that week, but I will probably take a bunch of pictures and see which ones I can get released to show you all.

Also, things are moving forward for No Ambition, my first feature.  I am writing the newest rewrite and I think this is the best it's ever been.  The next major step for that is to cast for the character "Eric Craig", the choleric/hair brained accomplice of "Dustin Broderick" the spacy main character, whom I've already cast.  I'm hoping to cast inside Solano county because this movie is about Solano and for Solano.  Still have a lot of work to do.

At my church (New Life Church), things are finally slipping into gear.  I have been oh-so-busy getting so much stuff done for that, but it's getting done.  We bought a sweet U-haul truck and I'm calling it Big Bertha.  Also, we are meeting at Laurel Creek School now, and later, on October 21st, I will be leading the worship band at an alternate venue in our Warehouse.  The situation is what you call a 'multi-site" church.  It's pretty common.  But it's been a lot of work recruiting a whole new band.  Very much a lot grande work.

Then on top of that, Priest's Awakening, my short sample of my trilogy of features I am developing is still moving forward.  I have special fx artists from all over the world working on that, so I've been pretty much glued to my email an hour or two a day for... well, forever it seems.  But things are looking great.  I just got done doing an interview for the Hub at the Pixel Corps http://www.pixelcorps.com/, and I'm thinking it would be a good time to ask Alex Lindsay to float some more member challenges out there so people might be inclined to work on some smaller aspects of that.  Alex is a totally awesome dude, and the founder of the Pixel Corps.  He used to be on Tech TV all the time too.

Anyways, I'm also helping my good buddy Isaac Escobedo do his feature called "Streets".  There was a great reading of it at Solano College in George Maguire's class http://imdb.com/name/nm0536574/ .  It went pretty well.  I can't wait to help Isaac move forward on that sometime next year tentatively. 

On top of that, I am engaged to Julia Stensrud who is enrolled at the Solano Cosmetology program.  It's a great program, but geez it steals her away every weekday for about 8 hours and that kind of sucks.  But, I think her goal is to learn how to movie makeup and hair, and that is totally fine with me.  In fact I talked to the Makeup artist on the feature I am assistant directing on and I believe Julia is going to be able to assist on one of the days.  Should be fun to have Julia around.  But, my heart is always arguing with my brain saying "hey you don't need to get that done right now, Julia is off of school, wait til tomorrow" but my brain is like "there is no tomorrow!".  SO, it's going to be a very busy October.  Love you babe.

Josh Harris