10 Days 'Til Sunday

That might not actually be true. I've been counting down the days until my girlfriend gets here and I'm pretty sure it's actually 11 days, but I haven't had the heart to tell her. lol. I've got to give my room a complete overhaul, fix my shower, and get a new bed before she gets here. I also have to finish all of her presents and get my Christmas shopping done (my dad hasn't sent money over from the Bahamas yet. sigh.) and get as much schoolwork done as I can because there's no way in hell that I'll be doing schoolwork after not having sex in 5 months. It's just not happening.

Blargh. Gotta get back to work.

-dk

ps: I may not agree with him, but I'm a big fan of Mike Huckabee. Go check out his mini-debate with Jon Stewart. It's definitly worth watching.

Starting some Op'ra sh*t.

I have a new appreciation for 'Requiem for a Dream' now that it's not in every trailer ever. 

Also, go check out Repo! The Genetic Opera's soundtrack. Even if the movie is lame, they made a kickass CD. I had downloaded Legal Assassin ages ago because I wish Anthony Stewart Head was my dad and taught me to fight vampires, but held off on the whole CD because I didn't want the movie to be ruined. Well, the movie played in, like, 6 theaters, so, fuck it. The soundtrack is great. I'd recommend Legal Assassin, Zydrate Anatomy, We Started This Op'ra Sh*t, and Let the Monster Rise, which will definitely pinpoint my taste in musicals once you listen to 'em.

Anyway. I'm gonna go start some Op'ra sh*t.

Peace out, internet.

dk

The Secretest Screenplay

"how about (you say) 'just got top secret information regarding a kickass film project I'm going to work on this summer, and let me tell you, I splooged my pants.'" - Mike Allen

I may not be able to legally blog about this script, but I can sure as hell blog that.

-dk

Fucked By Thanksgiving

At least, I hope I won't be. Not only do I expect a significant increase in my new all time low weight (gotta be cut by Fast-Fizz: the movie!) but this week-long break comes right before the SAT, and I sure as hell know that no matter how much martial artsy focus I use, I am not gonna be studying much during that time. I'll still have a little more than a week to cram everything I can before the actual test, but I really coulda used the extra study time. Sigh. I hope I'm worrying for no reason. SVA isn't that hard to get into and I've been rockin' the SAT prep course. Fingers crossed that everything works out in the end.

Also, sidenote: Mortal Kombat vs. DC Universe may be incredibly lame, but I defy you to tell me that it isn't fun as all hell to drop an MK1 machine on your groaning friend. That's AWESOME. You know this. Accept it and move on.

-dk

Pastasex.

The Rough Cut is slowly movin' along. Mike's been doing some edits up at school and I've been working on t-shirts and the website layout and all that. It's not going quite as quickly as I'd like, but these things take time, so it's totally understandable. This is the first movie I've made where there are, like, y'know, plots, so I can understand while teen dramedies take more time than people fighting over magic trench coats or adaptations of men in cyborg suits who bob their heads a bunch and love the word 'fuck'.

Also, we might have a new movie to film in December? Aside from finishing the Rough Cut and (hopefully) filming with Josh Gad, our December slate looked pretty bare. There's a zombie project that we've been stirring around the idea pot for a while, but that's a handicam movie, so it wouldn't really use any of these nifty new tricks we learned over Rough Cut, which was my only real problem with it. Luckily, Jon (that Jewish kid on all the Rough Cut posters) can write apparently, and came up with a pretty sweet screenplay about finding what you want to do in life that just happens to have super powers in it. It's not ABOUT super powers, they're just in it. It's a thing. You'll see. Probably.

This might be the first movie that we legitimately 'cast' cast. Mike recently held auditions for his short film that were arranged via Craig's List, which, hilarious though it may sound, proved very effective. There are way too many good actors and not nearly enough parts, and actors will totally do stuff for fun, practice, or just something to put on their reel. Should we have done this for Rough Cut? Maybe. Have we learned our lesson? Hell yes. Working with a lead we don't know personally, using everything we learned over the summer, and having Jon direct will prove to be a very interesting experience.

Will this movie have a legitimate production blog? Mayhap. An extra person who is obligated to help with production should make things considerably easier. My one major regret with the Rough Cut was not loading the prop camera with tape and a battery to make a really kickass production diary. There just wasn't enough time to think about it. I've been considering assigning someone else entirely to do the production diary/making of. That'd take a lot of pressure off me AND get more people involved in the project AND be a sweet compilation book, once we make enough movies. Good idea, me. Good idea.

Now, here it is, your Moment of Zen.

Ali: mmmm my food is done
Ali: but its super hot
Me: aw
Me: blow on it
Me: also
Me: bow chicka bow wow
Ali: really
Me: blowin' on me certainly doesn't make me less hot
Me: BAM
Ali: really
Me: I'm sure we can steam up a room better than pasta can
Me: SHAZAMBAM

I have no idea why she's still with me. <3

-dk

Rough Cut Website?!

5 am is like, website building time, right? Officially? Pretty sure I read that somewhere not made up. Regardless, the last two 5 am's I've lived through have been completely dedicated to building the official Rough Cut website.

Mike gave me very specific instructions as to what he wanted the site to look like, and I whipped something up in Photoshop, that will then be translated into HTML via Dreamweaver and then slapped onto the internet at http://roughcutstudios.com.

We're hoping that the website will eventually evolve into the website for the production studios (cause, let's face it, The Rough Cut doesn't really need it's own website. It's like, what, 40 minutes long and shot in DV? Come on.

Er, uh, I mean, it is styled in the DV format, and supplemented with HD footage, to... uh... hour and a half...

Donateplzkcool.

-dk

ps: how 'bout that Presidency?

ps2: way to post this on multiple blogs, dk. real smooth.

Reconstruction.

Yup.

Episode 19 still not out.

Sigh.

-dk

ps: epic fail on blogging this month. jeez.

The Blackest of Fuzz

Okay! Almost sort of over being sick. Grrr-eat. Not too much to catch up on. My entire life routine has been thrown off by that one night of no sleep and the sickness that followed. I haven't been to the gym or karate since, but hopefully tonight I'll make my return.

Recently, the internet has been swept with fandom for Joss Whedon's 'Dr. Horrible's Sing Along Blog' and, being a veteran Browncoat and a huge Buffy/Angel nut, I couldn't be happier about it. The thing made ME want to start auditioning for musicals... and, well, I'm not getting my chance to do that, but I AM getting a chance to get one of my characters onto the infamous Evil League of Evil.

We had heard of the contest but knew that there was no way to enter it, since I was at home and everyone else in the crew was off at their various colleges... but then Jake called me and told me he was coming down for the weekend. Coincidentally, Jake was the person Mike and I were talking about entering in the contest, were we able to enter at all.

Earlier in this blog I talked about a comic book project I'm working on called 'Fast-Forward & Mr. Fizz!'. The villain of this piece is known as Black Fuzz. Essentially, Jake Goldberg was a friend of Fast-Fizz, but they visisted him nearly every day at his summer job in the mall's '2-Happy Bear' (a poorly translated Japanese Build-A-Bear) and hilariously forced him to do the one thing he hated most: his job. He grew sick of building the duo their random stuffed animal ideas, and told them he'd give them a free stuffed animal if they went and made sure his front door was closed, as he didn't want his dog getting out. Long story short, several sci-fi events happened on their way to Jake's house, and they never made it there, his dog escaped and was seemingly killed in a lightning storm, and Jake became their arch-nemesis... Black Fuzz.

Overly complicated? Only in description. Greeen lightning + whatever you're holding = super powers. Done.

Black Fuzz, essentially, has kinetic control over stuffed animals, and his costume reflects that. His costume ALSO reflects his tendency to take himself more seriously than he ought to, as he merely wears his work uniform (a 2-happy bear t-shirt and a stuffed bear helmet) and a purple cape. In his defense, the purple cape compliments him quite well, buuut it's not exactly threatening. We built the Black Fuzz helmet out of a duct-tape reinforced paper lantern, some stuffing from a now deceased pillow, and the most lucky find in the world. I was looking all over our local fabric store for the right color for the helmet, and I had settled on an ugly brown color. I mean, he was a bear and we had like a day before Jake had to go back up to college, so I copped out. But upon arriving at the fabric cutting counter, I saw the perfect stuff. Not only was it the perfect color, but it was also clearly teddy-bear fabric. It was super shaggy but super fluffy. It was perfect. We didn't get to finish the cape in time, nor the hilarious teddy bear boxing gloves, but we're hoping to make a Fast-Fizz feature film soon, so if this goes well we'll make the full costume and hopefully get some publicity.

One thing we're worried about is having to give up the rights to the character. This happened to Mike's brother Phil when he starred in 'Who Wants to be a Super Hero?' season 2. He had to give up Omnicron, who we wanted to make a comic about.

Fingers crossed that everything works out. I'm gonna go back to blowing off my SAT work.

Rock on,
dk

Sick

Again?! I thought I was just getting over being sick, but apparently that was just a precursor to this new sickness. I figured out how I got sick, too. I drank my friend's redbull on Ninja Night, and she was sick, apparently. God damn it. I feel like I can't do ANYTHING. I've been skimming through my SAT books, but my headache is very distracting. Sigh.

I did have the chance to check out two short films, though. The first one is called 'Super Powers' and deals with a couple getting over their sexual frustration... with super hero costumes. Definitely worth checking out, if you've got six minutes. The second film, 'The Soldier', is a 28 Days Later sort of film, about Nazi created zombies. Very cool. Very suspenseful. Go check it out, even if you don't have ten minutes.

Alright, I'm gonna attempt to do more work so I have stuff to tell my girlfriend and I feel like didn't waste my day (Cause I totally just wasted my day).

Peace out,
dk

ps: go me for figuring out links. how snazzy does that look? mighty snazzy.

Okay, fine. I'll jinx myself.

I'm reading through my big ol' College Board SAT practice book, and so far I'm thinkin' that this stuff isn't THAT hard. Or, not the English stuff, anyway. I'm also in the first fifty pages or so, so I'm expecting to get my literary ass handed to me very soon. Fingers crossed the difficulty doesn't spike.

And great thanks to Mike Allen for helping me with my college resume! We went over it last night and added some things I forgot about or changed some things to make me seem more awesome (by which I mean nothing, colleges who may be reading this). Ali's also been giving me pointers, albeit it in an adorable 'mine is better than yours' sort of way <3.

Also, you'd think writing about social networking would be easier. I'm supposed to write a paper on MySpace and Facebook and this new generation of social networking and how it's changed social interaction. Maybe I'm coming at it the wrong way. I wish I could just submit my MySpace and my blog and call it a day.

-dk

ps: this entire post was an excuse to post that picture. there. I said it.

pss: the SAT book ended up beating me. it took advantage of my inability to pay attention. douche.

Damn you, Xbox Live.

You just haaaad to be down, didn't you?

grumblemumbleinternetgamingfrumble.

-dk

Shaolinternet?

This morning, I discovered that I had an email from a man asking about one of my old DeviantArt submissions, called 'Shaolin' (not pictured). It was a picture I took in Thailand of me in front of a window doing the traditional Kung Fu bow that I then tweaked in Photoshop. He told me he was a martial artist with a school in Qufu, south of Beijing in Shandong Province, and he was building their website. He asked if he could use my image on their site, and we've started talking about Kung Fu and his master, Shi Yan Jia. Shi Yan Jia grew up as a monk in the Shaolin Temple in the Henan Province. He also invited me to come to the school, if I ever made it out to China.

Honestly, this wasn't the way I always dreamed of helping out Shaolin Monks, but hey... it's still pretty bad ass. Go check them out! It's a beautiful school, truly.

Qufu Shaolin Martial Arts School

-dk

Sleep vs. Me

I'm working on my resume for my NYU Tisch application and I feel like I'm gonna die. I woke up at 4:30 pm, so my sleep schedule is clearly still fucked. I also woke up with a monster headache. I don't know why my body's been so fucked up lately... unable to sleep, headaches, no voice... my mom suggested that it may be the stress of school. It could be. Totally possible.

This resume certainly isn't helping any... I've got it formatted pretty well, and everything I actually have on there looks pretty good, but unfortunately I've only got one internation TV credit, and my extensive work on The Rough Cut. I'm considering adding all of our YouTube shorts to the list... I mean, we've got nearly 400 subscribers and upwards of 200,000 views. That's a lot, right? Totally worth mentioning to the all mighty NYU Tisch. I hope.

I threw in that I can rock Final Cut and Photoshop with the best of 'em (don't judge me by my blog banner) and that I picked up Japanese in Tokyo, art classes in Florence, and Muay Thai in Thailand. I'm not entirely sure how much the Muay Thai will help me, but it was in Bangkok, so that's gotta count for something? My experience as a karate insctructor also made it onto there.

Hope I wake up soon.

Srsly.

Assemble!!

So, it's 8:18 pm, and I've been awake for about an hour or so. Yesterday, at around 8 om, I went to my dojo and we began what is known as Ninja Night. Ninja Night is a 12 hour event at our school where we watch the kids for around 12 hours. We teach them Karate, do drills, games, obstacle courses, lightsaber fights, dodgeball, all kinds of fun stuff for the kids... the down side? It lasts 12 hours. Right now, I am dead. Dead. Like, dinner dead.

My sleep schedule has already been massively fucked up due to my habit of going to bed at 5 am these days (I blame Mike Allen and Halo 3), but I just woke up at 7 pm and I'm completely awake. How am I going to sleep tonight? I can barely type right now.

It was fun, though. I was in charge of 13 kids and we were known as 'The Avengers, sponsored by Taco Bell'. They all had super hero nicknames (I was Colonel Nick Fury, obviously) and they all rallied together every time I yelled 'Avengers, Assemble!'. Yeah, it was bad ass. I took a lot of pictures to show my girlfriend (I love my girlfriend) and have just realized I am too tired to keep typing about this. More later.

I hope.

Duuuude. Colleeeege.

I've been trying to get into college, these last few months, and it's becoming increasingly stressful. I'm taking the SAT's on the first of November (which is also the reason I couldn't go up to NY to visit her on Halloween in my sweet-ass Deadpool costume) and I've got a month left to study for it. What the hell am I DOING? I SUCK at tests and I have a MONTH. I can always take it again in December if I bomb too badly, but I would really love to do decently the first time around so I don't have to stress over this whole thing again.

In case I DO fail out beyond all reason, my back up school is New York Film Academy, which isn't my backup school because it's bad, but because anyone can get in with a diploma and the money to pay for it. It seems like a hxc trade school (cause, well, it is) and they have really good guest speakers from the industry and a notable alumni or two, but I'm worried about getting a good job if I go to a school like that. I mean, I know there's very little chance that I'll get into NYU Tisch or something like that, but if I DID, I think it'd be time to renounce my atheism and high five GOD over that miracle. 

Another school I've been looking at is SVA, the School of Visual Arts. My girlfriend turned me on to this one, and my best friend's friend goes there, and apparently he loves it. He also had a legit feature job very early on, so I'm gonna trust his judgement based solely on that incredible small bit of information. The reviews of SVA are pretty good, and it seems ridiculously easy to get into (jinx?). There's an open house on the 8th of November, too, and I'd love to go visit the NY schools around then and take my girl out on the town since I had to flake on Halloween. 

The reviews I've read so far for NYFA are less good. I've heard that it's really focused and really intense, but there's also not enough time to finish up your project and the editing rooms are really crowded. I'm set up with Final Cut Pro and Motion and all that already, so I'm hoping I can escape the cramped, sweaty editing rooms. I'm also kind of concerned that everyone there is gonna be all business. Really professional, but all business. Last time I was up in NY, I took a tour, and that's the impression that I got (and not just because the tour took five minutes and the dude never stopped talking). It's better than them being stuck up and douchey, which was my concern with Tisch, but it's sort of a lesser of two evils situation. 

Fingers crossed I'm not the only guy up there that feels this way, huh? 

Speaking of film making and my sweet-ass Deadpool costume, I just talked to my best buddy

Mike about making an HD Deadpool teaser trailer. I'd play DP in the costume, and he'd shave his head and apply his incredibly good zombie makeup (pictured right) for when the mask comes off. Shaving your head for a weekend project... now that, good sir, is dedication. 

Yikes. Karate in 10. Gotta peace out. Later, blog!

-dk

Event Title, Huh?

So apparently 'events' are the new names for blog posts. Huh. Whatever, I'm doing this from my fucking phone (omgsocool), I don't care what they call it. I kinda wish I could do that sideways thing that my iPhone loves to do, though... Can my right thumb alone update the Internet on my entire life?
In all likelyhood, yes. I really don't blog that much. I really really want to START, though. One inspiration I had to blog is this YouTuber named tokyocooney. He's lived in Tokyo for over six years, and now he's video blogging about it to educate YouTube. Bad ass. I almost starting doing that when I went to Thailand, buuut I got distracted getting punched in the face at the Bangkok Fight Club. Good times.
The most recent episode I saw of this showed him meeting with a man named Ken Tanaka, who was a white baby adopted by Japanese and raised in Japan. Tall, skinny, red haired dude, who barely speaks English and has an amazing Japanese accent. Random combinations like this definitely make me love people.

(Non-iPhone Edit!)

My blog post with the iPhone app seemed kinda not-too wordy. Hrm. I like the wordy thing. Also, I probably would have included links and pictures and stuff like that if I had just done it on the desktop, like I'm doing now. Gotta work on that... by practicing right NOW!

http://www.youtube.com/user/tokyocooney

Go check that guy out. He's a bad ass.

hope this goes better next time,
-dk

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So, I'm Testing Out This iPhone App...

Test, test, test!

Test!

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Blogsentment

I hate it when I get to lazy and/or distracted by the Juno DVD commentary to finish writing a blog post, 'cause then I feel pressured into finishing it, and bummed when I don't.

That being said, I'm gonna go watch the outtakes.

Stay boss,

DKxC

I WOULD be sick.

So I'm back from New York and I feel like shit.

I was all snifflycough at Jenel's this last week, but I thought it was her cat, Condalisa Rice. Nope. Turns out I've got a semi-not-too-bad fever... and take my advice: NEVER fly when every hole in your head is plugged up. Worst headache I've ever had. The lady sitting next to me moved because she didn't want brains on her 'I Love NY' shirt.

But as for the trip itself, we got a LOT done. Well, actually, no we didn't. We had one day where we got a lot done. Friday. I had never been to a convention on Friday, but I'm definitely heading in that direction from now on. They had like, 80% of what they had on Saturday, and the con wasn't hxc crowded with people. And, on that note, a good 15% of said people were cosplaying. I think people are nervous about dressing up when they have to wade through the streets of NY to get to the con. At Megacon, there were more people dressed up than not and the majority of them were dressed up in anime. I'm half Japanese, so I do dig anime, but I'm gonna state something right now.

Marvel > Anime. Hands down. 

Luckily, this is the first comic con I've been to that was actually a COMIC con. Marvel, DC, Darkhorse, and barely any Narutards. I think it's because the majority of Marvel comics take place in New York, so a higher concentration of Marvel fans are gonna be there and crowding around Stan Lee (who I got within 20 feet of. SCORE!)

And, best of all, we got turned on to this digital publishing site called Ka-Blam. I dunno if I've talked about this before because I'm super sick and feelin' like death ain't such a bad Plan B, but Ka-Blam is an affordable and surprisingly option-heavy publishing site. Fifty 22-page comics will run you about $130. You won't make much of a profit, mind you, but that's what t-shirts and trade paperbacks are for. 

I got really excited about the concept of actually making some cash with Fast-Fizz when I was at the con. There were a lot of indie publishers out there, and, not to sound over-confident, but we're better than a LOT of them. If they can make cash, who says we can't? But that's really not what I'm in it for. I just want to tell stories. 

Okay, I'm gonna die. Writing more later.

Rock on,

DKxC

Comic Books?

I'm a really ADD guy, and not just because I have diagnosed ADD. I bounce around projects like nobody's business, but one thing that I've been working on consistently for almost a year is a comic book called 'Fast-Forward & Mr. Fizz', a comedy about two teenagers who gain semi-epic powers and a very-epic future. The comic features loads of super hero shenanigans, ninjas, and giant robots, so there's something in it for fans of western and eastern comics, alike. The comic's production has finally started to hit it's comicy stride, and this blog will probably end up as a production diary or something. Just letting y'know. 

The two main characters, Donald Zen (Fast-Forward) and Jimmy Kaine (Mr. Fizz) gain their powers from a freak accident involving giant robots (told you!) fighting in space indirectly causing a super-powered lightning storm to give our heroes their powers and send them into the future. It's not the best future in the world, so a good deal of their antics revolve around trying to prevent the world from suck. 

Surprisingly enough, the actual process of making a comic book is way less daunting than it seems. I mean, okay, we may not have anything DONE yet, but so far everything is running smoothly. Issue 1's script is done, issue 2 drafted, and issue 3 has a very solid synopsis. That's the whole first arc (aside from the art and the actual 'comic' part)! 

Me, Mike (best friend and co-creator), and Jenel (our boss and financier) went out to New York Comic Con last week to do 'research' on the whole comic thing, and, something no one ever actually saw coming, we did said research. We bounced from booth to booth, asking artists and writers how they got their stuff published and some challenges they had when making their comics. The guys (and girl) from Monolith Comics pointed us in the direction of Ka-Blam! digital printing, a website that not only publishes your COMICS for surprisingly reasonable fees, but mini-posters, fliers, t-shirts, trade paperbacks, and even hardcovers... pretty much everything we need to set up a booth at one of these cons and start selling comics.

One thing that I've been wondering for a while is whether or not we're going to publish the comics online, or just stick to selling them. Personally, I'd really like to put the comics online and sell them, but the problem lies in whether or not people are going to buy them if they're online for free... and, inversely, if people are even going to know/care about us if we don't start up an internet community via webcomic. My lovely friend sitting next to me has just suggested we don't put ALL of them online. My idea: put extra stuff in the printed comic. I mean, if they know us from the internet and care enough to come check us out, they'll eat up extra stuff. I'd eat up extra stuff. Why can't we just cater to me? 

Peace out,

DKxC

Layouts. Whoo.

Layouts are a pain, yo. I'm trying to make a decent looking layout that isn't too hxc fancy and doesn't look like every other lame blog with a black layout. I'm liking this custom header thing, and the fact that I can have dual blogs on the same page... that'll be useful for when the comic site gets under way. My only real concern is changing up the layout once I buy a domain name. If anyone knows how to mess with this, let me know.

more later,

DKxC

Yeah! Blogging!

So, contrary to the totally expository name of my brand new blog, I have no idea how to do this. Like, I have my friend on iChat right now, and she's making fun of me for the amount I don't know how to do this. I'm gonna assume, like most things in print, I should start out with an introduction. Ahemz.

I'm Donald Wemyss Christopher Thomas Nelson Ike Knowles. I'm a Japanese/Bahamian/English/American who lives in South Florida, but occasionally travels back home to the island of Nassau. I'm a martial artist and a film maker (and you should totally check out youtube.com/jistofmyfist and watch me do both of those things!) and I'm beginning to think this introductory paragraph thing is getting kind of lame. So, I'm gonna wrap this up, and maybe add another blog post (dude, you have no idea how excited I get when I say that. blogging rules.) later tonight. 

Okay, you guys rule, will update this thing later tonight. Probably. 

Rock on,

DKxC