Thomas Productions News Blog

Online Entities

2010-02-08T19:53:00.000-08:00

It's a one-two punch: both Part I of "Three Shorts: Commentary on Society" (2003) and "Thief" (2006) have each surpassed 400 views on YouTube! The former ("3 Shorts") currently has 425 views, and the latter ("Thief") has 416. View 'em below!

You can also view all of this year's Oscar-nominated Animated Shorts below, at least before they're ever removed from the web!

French Roast:

The Lady and the Reaper:

Logorama (Pts. I & II):

Wallace and Gromit in A Matter of Loaf and Death:

Granny O'Grimm's Sleeping Beauty:

Bunch of Names

2010-02-02T07:39:00.000-08:00

And so the nominees are officially announced. The Hurt Locker and Avatar tied with 9 noms apiece, the highest quantity achieved! However, Avatanic received zero nods for acting and screenplay, which luckily implies it's just a techie. See the noms here.

As a second tie-in to this blog entry's title, the Names Database has been updated for the first time in several months. Apparently, it had not yet contained the names of those involved with Journey of the Mind, including the neurological experts... until now!

First Female, Pt. 1

2010-01-31T12:45:00.000-08:00

Wahoo! The Hurt Locker is on a role! Its director, Kathryn Bigelow, became the first woman in history last night to win the top award from the Director's Guild of America.

All but 6 previous winners of this top DGA award, for the past 61 years, then also went on to win the Academy Award for Best Director.

All I know is, this is awesome. A filmmaker from San Carlos has won the top award from the DGA, and she's the first person in history to be female to do it.

Big Bear Fare

2010-01-28T17:48:00.000-08:00

The deed is done: Journey of the Mind has been submitted to the festival in my birthtown of Big Bear Lake!

So far, I've always entered things into festivals through the Earlybird Deadline, which provides the least expensive submission cost. For this particular festival, however, the festival itself is in September, but their Earlybird is in January, eight months prior -- more than half a year! Just sayin'...

Now, 'bout to get 2 Vimeo uploads through Pen TV, hopefully in the next week!

Take That, Avatanic

2010-01-24T21:18:00.000-08:00

Just when the little movie that could seemed to have lost its spark at the GGs last week, it was selected as Best Picture of the Year by the Producers Guild of America! The Hurt Locker was chosen BY PRODUCERS, not just a selection of foreign journalists. Actual producers made this choice. Wahoo!

During the Screen Actors Guild Awards the day before, the Best Ensemble award went not to THL, but to Inglourious Basterds. Hrm... For the SAGs, Avatar wasn't even nom'd, but for the PGAs, it was and still lost to Bigelow's film. THL is back, baby.

Barely a week 'till Oscar noms come out, on Feb. 2nd!

Checkoffs Begin!

2010-01-23T14:24:00.000-08:00

It's a belated list, but here are 10 items that Thomas Productions intends to accomplish during 2010:

Submit Journey of the Mind to at least one festival (√)
Have at least one more project entered onto IMDb (√)
Complete Editing of Alex and Mike's Alaskan Cruise by February (◊)
Create Everyone and Their Mother by April, submit to CurrentTV in time for Mothers Day (◊)
Submit at least one project to Vimeo (◊)
Finish reediting of Brave New World (◊)
Touch up The Nightmare, submit to undetermined festival
Create new[er] logo for Thomas Productions
Start creating another widescreen movie (possibly Hitchcock Road, possibly in HD?)
Complete Demo Reel for VFX

What's great about this list is that some items (√) have already been checked off! Everything that was completed occurred after the new year started -- some things even in the past week. For instance, Journey of the Mind is now officially recognized by IMDb, starting yesterday!

Other items on the list are well into being started or planned (◊), such as Brave New World, for which the redigitizing of all remaining footage has officially been completed. For Vimeo, permission was granted by Pen TV to post both At the Core and Journey of the Mind online through their website, since both projects have now aired on their channel.

Then, some listed items have not been started yet, though there are samples like the above YouTube video (made years ago for a class) that continue to influence my future decisions. Thennn, there are unlisted items that are sure to continue, including more YouTube posts, further site tweaks, continued searching for theatrical possibilities, a neverending quest for monetary donations, activities of an unplanned nature, and more!

Big Dog

2010-01-17T23:42:00.000-08:00

What a crazy few nights it has been. Prior to tonight, The Hurt Locker seemed it was the prize winner-to-be, winning everything (and I mean EVERYTHING) in its path regarding picture and director. Last night specifically, it won those awards at the Critics' Choice Awards. Tonight at the Golden Globes, however, Avatar unexpectedly (even James Cameron claimed he wasn't expecting this) took those prizes.

I still think there's a good chance for Bigelow's THL, considering that the GGs are not the best indicator of who will win at the Academy Awards. Such recent Oscar-winning films as No Country for Old Men (2007), The Departed (2006), Crash (2005) and Million Dollar Baby (2004) also did NOT win GGs for Best Picture -- Crash was not even nominated!

I think they chose Avatar for the win here in order to help further solidify the film (and its sci-fi status) as a prominant Oscar nom for Best Pic. It will certainly be a tech marvel, but its dialogue reeked of flatness that not even 3D glasses could save.

On a different note, Part 1 of The Dog of Pompeii (1999) surpassed the 4,000 views benchmark on YouTube today! It currently holds 4,004, and is our second project to do this. Additionally, Xena Thomas, my deceased border collie who portrayed Zeus in the movie, has finally earned her credit online at IMDb. It only makes sense for the title character to be credited!

SF Shorts Fest

2010-01-14T19:02:00.000-08:00

Last night, I officially entered Journey of the Mind into the San Francisco International Festival of Short Films through Withoutabox. Today, I mailed off the DVD, the only necessary physical piece.

I still plan to send it to Big Bear as well, but should this make it into either festival, the likelihood I can attend is far greater in SF! Regardless, if it at least makes it into consideration in either, you can bet your behind that another IMDb entry is on the way!

Keep Hap'nin'

2010-01-12T12:14:00.000-08:00

Two recurring things are continuing for Thomas Productions. First, another of our documentaries, At the Core, is finally getting airtime on television! Specifically through Pen TV, it begins to be broadcast tomorrow during In the Mix, which specifically airs at the following times: 4:30 pm M/W/Th/F, 2:30 & 6 pm Sat, 3 pm Sun. Journey of the Mind will most likely continue to be broadcast during then as well.

Then, on YouTube, Scenes from Being John Malkovich has surpassed 5,000 views! With 5,008 views at current, that project keeps passing thousand after thousand, quicker and quicker. Also, My Teachers Are Aliens and The Last Kiss each just passed the 900 mark (with 913 and 904 views, respectively). We're nearing another 4,000-milestone, with Part 1 of The Dog of Pompeii (with 3,922), and another 400-milestone, too, with Part 1 of Three Shorts... (with 375).

'Bout to continue entering festivals... More on that soon!

Sesquicentenniblog

2010-01-06T11:04:00.000-08:00

That's gotta be a term for you -- sesquicentennial, that is. For those that don't know, it defines an anniversary of 150 years. While nobody has stuck around for one of those that long in marriage (nor life), there are still those that exist for other reasons -- California's occurred just 10 years ago, back in 2000, when the state became that old. This blog certainly isn't that old (nor is the internet itself), but my alteration of the term in the title hopefully indicates to you that this is the 150th blog entry!

As such, there's some happy news and some sad news to give out, before celebrating. Starting with the sad news: our entry, Journey of the Mind, unfortunately did not make it into the different from what? film festival. It was good, however, that we were let down easily with an email that still praised the project. It's soon to get entered into yet another festival or two; can't determine if Big Bear or SF Short Fest would work better, or if I should just do both! I'd like to get The Nightmare out, too, but I need to ramp it up if I want to tweak it.

Now, the happy news: through using Withoutabox, I've figured out not only how to upload movies to IMDb, but how to do it for movies that have long existed on IMDb without incorporating Withoutabox at the start! In other words, you can now view The Last Kiss in its entirety from IMDb! I've remastered the sound, and slightly altered the contrast levels of the visuals. I may do this for The Dog of Pompeii in the coming months...

Finally, the celebration of 150! What isn't more celebratory than the choices for #1 movie of the past year by A.O. Scott & Michael Phillips on At the Movies?

BTW, Ebert's #1 choice apparently was The Hurt Locker, but that was only learned through its placement of #2 on his best of the decade list, since his yearly picks now aren't ranked. THL was also high on Scott's & Phillips' lists, at #2 & #4, respectively. Let's go, Bigelow, let's go! (Whoo! Whoo!)

Happy New Yearandaday!

2010-01-02T23:42:00.000-08:00

Happy New Year-and-a-Day! Not a big message this time; just enjoy the moment, and maybe our latest entry at GPicturama, too, which glorifies riding a ferry boat out of San Francisco!

Fruitful Year

2009-12-27T15:54:00.000-08:00

2009 has been a fruitful year for Thomas Productions. We've entered two film festivals (with more on the way), we put another project ("At the Core") on IMDb through Withoutabox, we have a project being broadcast on the airwaves of television, we've created the 2nd of 3 demo reels (for cinematography), we continue to post projects on YouTube & pictures on GPicturama (the latter now with Lytebox), and the "Z" section of the site has a new look for both the Film Ratings & Oscar Predictions segments.

Specifically for YouTube, our records continue to fly through the roof! For example, Scenes from Being John Malkovich has nearly 5,000 views (4,833 as of today). The directorG2006 YouTube Channel itself currently has 1,176 views.

Site redirections and the 3rd section of the site ("uuuq") have been working quite well. The 2nd section ("bingodisk"), however, continues to be frustrating to upload to, as it cannot utilize the regular ftp method, and it frequently fails. I'm considering replacing it with something similar to "uuuq" in the coming year...

The time has come to ramp up a notch submitting both Journey of the Mind and The Nightmare to festivals through Withoutabox; these should happen by mid-January. Then, I recently earned permission through Pen TV to film such projects as Everyone and Their Mother with their equipment.

Happy New Year in the coming days! Should know the results of the different from what? festival by then...

On the Air

2009-12-24T13:46:00.000-08:00

Verified by my own eyes yesterday, Journey of the Mind officially began airing on Peninsula Television (Cable Channel 26) this week, and will continue to for several weeks, nearly 7 days a week! It's part of their show, In the Mix, and specifically airs at the following times: 4:30 pm M/W/Th/F, 2:30 & 6 pm Sat, 3 pm Sun.

Its 18 minute duration is only part of the half-hour show, so it begins 7 to 10 minutes into the program. While this is not the first project we've had broadcast (this would be Peninsula Quiz Kids Video Segment in 2001), it's the first full-length [short] movie.

Actually, that previous project, part of the local high school game show, Peninsula Quiz Kids, also naturally aired on Pen TV. Our PQK Video Segment represented Carlmont High School in Belmont. In more recent years, the game show additionally started airing on KRON-4, but I doubt the show still utilizes such representative clips of schools nowadays.

Happy Holidays!

Journey of the Dates

2009-12-17T14:25:00.000-08:00

First, it is time to mention Peninsula Television, or Pen TV for short. A local channel in the peninsula (cable channel 26), it is where I currently have an internship. Starting the 21st of this month, it will start to show Journey of the Mind (and most likely At the Core as well) 5 or 6 days of the week for a good block of time! More on that once it airs -- it might even get a block on Vimeo. Stay tuned...

Then, by the 23rd, entrants of the festival, different from what?, are supposed to have been notified whether or not their submissions made it or not. So, if Journey of the Mind makes it, we should know in a week!

Lady from San Carlos

2009-12-14T18:24:00.000-08:00

Day by day, I become more fascinated by Kathryn Bigelow, Director of The Hurt Locker. She's already well-known since before this film, has earned quite acclaim through THL this year, and apparently even was married to James Cameron at one point in her life.

Now, in this past week, she's won the award of Best Director for the film in question across the board from the various film critics' circles, including those for NY, SF, LA, Boston, Southeastern, Alliance of Women Film Journalists, and more! In most of these, The Hurt Locker also won Best Picture. (Source: AwardsDaily.com)

Though these are not the Oscars, these precursors to them have officially begun, and they affect my predictions immensely. This could finally be the year a very capable woman (from the town I grew up in to boot) wins the Award for Best Directing! Tomorrow's when the Golden Globes' noms will be announced...

Wouldn't that be something if she wins Best Director, and her ex wins Best Picture for Avatar?

Versus

2009-12-10T22:37:00.000-08:00

In the past week, I've become aware of the competition between two professional still cameras, since learning they can now also take professional quality video, sometimes even HD quality!

It wasn't until tonight that I even put two and two together, realizing that Ashton Kutcher's commercials for Nikon of late were sometimes specifically for the Nikon camera in question, the D5000. While that may or may not shoot in HD, it does shoot in 24p, and has an awesomely flexible LCD screen. In either camera, the video's depth of field would be spectacular.

More info comparing the Nikon D5000 and the Canon Rebel T1i here.

FutureFest

2009-12-01T20:31:00.000-08:00

As the entry dates are coming up quick, I started reviewing some various film festivals to submit Journey of the Mind and The Nightmare to.

First off, it's always best to shoot for the Earlybird Deadline because the cost of that is cheapest. So far, upcoming festivals in the next few months that is possible for include SF Shorts, Humboldt Film Festival, and Big Bear Int'l Film Festival, the last of which I've had my eyes on all along for The Nightmare.

The full list of fests & dates being considered (and it could be expanded further as time progresses) can be found here:
directorG.uuuq.com/festivals

Novemberama, Pt. 2

2009-11-28T00:03:00.000-08:00

'Nuther quick update for GPicturama this month: November 28th!

This entry is called, Half Moon Bay & Unexpected Tragedy. The tragedy part doesn't involve anyone I knew, and it's not even what my coastal trip was for, but that event still overshadowed everything else that day. Check it out.

Academy Shortlists

2009-11-21T20:11:00.000-08:00

For the advancement of official voting choices by Academy members, several shortlists have recently been released to the public to narrow down what must be viewed prior to voting. These shortlists thus far are for Animated Feature-Length (20), Animated Short (10), Feature-Length Doc (15), and Short Doc (8). These shortlists are significant to this site for the Oscar Predicting I do annually, so the according lists are at the 2009 segment of that part of it.

While I won't post those full shortlists here, there are a few videos worth embedding here, because there are some that still manage to be fully viewable. Full videos are always best because it's easier to vote for something if your video was more accessible!

Housekeeping

2009-11-17T21:48:00.000-08:00

Since more and more duties keep being assigned, I am going to try and arrange a list of tasks (and dates, if there are any specific deadlines) for the upcoming months, for all those related to Thomas Productions:

Submit Journey of the Mind to a Withoutabox-correlated festival => Garners invitation from IMDb for film
Make copy of Journey of the Mind (and possibly At the Core?) for airing on local television broadcast
Complete editing Alex and Mike's Alaskan Cruise by late December
Send copy of Journey of the Mind to Epilepsy Foundation of Northern California
Touch up The Nightmare to make ready for Big Bear Int'l Film Festival submission in January, which would also make this project IMDb-capable
Start Preproduction for Everyone and Their Mother, so it can be filmed in December/January, then ready for CurrentTV come Mother's Day, 2010
Finish reediting newly digitized footage of Brave New World for eventual uploading on YouTube
Create VFX Demo Reel

You may notice that The Nightmare "snuck back" into the list. I certainly haven't forgotten about that project! I fully intend to do at least as much festivalwise for it as with Journey of the Mind, because it was a fully scripted drama, not a documentary!

You may also notice that Hitchcock Road was NOT mentioned. I do still intend for its production, but with so much currently on my plate (and these duties aren't my only ones, mind you), I think it's better to try and see the horizon before things get lost in oblivion. In time, in time...

Web Journey

2009-11-15T00:31:00.000-08:00

In this small window of free time today, I've completed the creation of the web page for Journey of the Mind here at directorG.com! It includes still frames, a synopsis, and credits. Video may come in time.

Soon, I hope to be able to do two things: 1) Send a copy to the Epilepsy Foundation of Northern California out of thanks for their kind permission to film at their Living With Epilepsy event during October, and 2) Submit this film to a film festival recognized by Withoutabox.com in order to get this project listed on IMDb!

Now Watchable!

2009-11-09T19:14:00.000-08:00

It's finally been done! Now, the full-length version of At the Core is entirely viewable from both YouTube and IMDb!

This had been delayed earlier due the movie's entry into this year's Mill Valley Film Festival, and I did not want a simultaneous online showing to hurt its chances. Now that this situation is over, I've made an executive decision and here we are!

On a different note, I've updated my Oscar Predictions part of the website (go here and choose Oscar Predictions). The actual dates for Nominees Announcement and Winners Ceremony have been released, and the hosts (plural!) have been chosen. I reeeeally want to view Precious...

Novemberama

2009-11-06T23:05:00.000-08:00

Remember that subsite from here called GPicturama? I know I haven't forgotten about it! It's been awhile since the last post on it, though, and I haven't had too much time to think about it just yet...

Still, I decided to post something on it today: Random Pics! A more thought-out entry will be the next posting, but for now, for the sake of keeping it alive, this'll do.

One-Two Punch

2009-11-01T11:11:00.000-08:00

In each of the past two weeks, a movie was completed by Thomas Productions! Two weeks ago, it was Journey of the Mind, and now this past week, it was a private wedding video for a friend. Lots of work now off my shoulders - whew!

However, there's still more to come! There was also an associated video project with the wedding video that was a travel video. I've thus far produced a trailer for it that has been approved for YouTube by its parties, and it's what you see above. I hope to have that project completed by Christmas.

THEN, I still intend to create Everyone and Their Mother... We'll see if Hitchcock Road ever resurfaces in 2010. I also plan to retouch The Nightmare up a bit for festival entry, not to mention a second fest for Journey of the Mind!! Entering those in fests through Withoutabox will help put more movies on IMDb. This is all not forgetting about remastering Brave New World... So much to do!

No More Geocities

2009-10-28T00:47:00.000-07:00

Another quick notice in this flurry of busy times... Geocities is no longer in operation. Anything that was on Geocities in the past for Thomas Productions (which refers to anything prior to the directorG.com domain even existed) now has been demolished.

I'm therefore glad that a few months back, I transferred over all of the images from the Washington D.C. fieldtrip to GPicturama! Otherwise, I'd have to start from scratch to repair that site, since none of my pics at that point (in '99) were originally digital yet -- scanned each and every one by hand. I hope I transferred other stuff, too... About to find that out.