Production Update September 2016
First of all, let me apologize for not getting the September update posted until October. Secondly, this “Production Update” is actually a pot pourri of our marketing and production activities for September; our new larger CTNx booth, our Pitch Reel to finish the doc, and finally a bit of production, on the “Kurtz on the Phone” scene. First the booth.
It was a busy month, in large part due to the first preparations for our CTNx booth this year, November 18, 19, 20, booth number B34 in the main hall between Gnomon School and Animation Mentor. Gwedolyn Arreola is heading the booth preparations this year, with Terry Wilson, Serena Oden, Priscilla Candelas, and Zabrina McIntyre, as her teammates. It’s still a month away, but it’s a bigger booth than last year, so we need to rustle up new materials for the walls and table tops. This will be our fourth CTN booth, so, hope you can come by and say hello, each booth gets a little better than the last. We’ll have sign up sheets for more crew members and potential backers, plus some give-aways, and items to sell, all proceeds going to the production of the documentary. If we’re able to rustle up some talented crew members and a decent pile of dead presidents, we should be able to pick up the pace and finish our master oeuvre before too long.
Another project that kept us busy in September was putting together a pitch reel to help in our new more vigorous campaign to raise additional funds and crew members. But, it also gives the best overview of production goalposts reached, up to the present, than anything else we’ve produced. We’ll have it finished very shortly, and make it available to you, so you may want to take a look for yourselves, and let us know what you think. It runs about five and a half minutes, but covers well over a decade of production work so far. If all goes well, we could quite possibly have a finished documentary by the summer of 2018, to be a bit more specific, but that means everything has to go perfectly. In any case, we’re all in this adventure for the long run, however long it takes. And, if you know anyone who might want to join our crew or become a Boing Backer, don’t hesitate to send them our way at info@theboingheardroundtheworld.com. If this new Pitch works well, we’ll have funds for the crew, and Boing Backers will get screen credit and other nifty gifts.
And, if September wasn’t jam packed already, production has picked up after our summer lull. Fenway Fan began the first “Sole Scene”. In other words, she is the first crew member, and there may be others down the line, who has undertaken an entire scene for our documentary, to produce solely on her own. Other scenes so far, are being produced by a team of animation artists; boarders, character designers, background artists, layout artists, animators, etc. Fenway has selected the “Kurtz on the Phone” scene to sole-create. She’d already designed the Bob Kurtz character, and roughed out the layouts, so she just needs to do the backgrounds and animation. But, she’s an all around talent, so it shouldn’t be difficult for her. She needs to stay within our specs, but she’s been with us for a couple of years now, so she’s very familiar with our process.
Her first undertaking for this scene has been to design a second character, the transitional character of John Culhane. The Culhane character enters for the first time in our documentary at the end of the “Kurtz on the Phone” scene, decked out as a fancy usher at a big majestic theater (character image attached). He opens the door to a long limo in which the Bob Kurtz character has just arrived, makes an exaggerated deep bow, then suddenly flips up into the air, and as he descends, he morphs into the John Culhane we interviewed as the living animation professor he was in New York City several years ago. Then, that live-action John Culhane picks up from there to begin the “Tao of Boing” scene, in which he explains why “Gerald McBoing Boing” is one of the greatest animated shorts ever made, as it consistently shows up on every “best animated shorts” lists.
So, that’s the news for September, we’ll try to get October to you on time, and a link to our new Pitch Reel. But, in the meantime, spread the word for more crew and cash, so we can move this documentary into high gear.
Category: Back Issues
