Wausau Through the Lens of a Video Camera
by erik on August 27th, 2008 • No Comments »
Hey all!
If you’re a fan of Stop That Nun on Facebook then you already have seen this bad boy, but for followers of this blog, I offer you a chance to see a scene and a half from the final cut of Microcosm.
Like what you see? The whole thing goes up for public screening on September 5th, 8:30 PM. The place is The University of Wisconsin: Marathon County, in the Theater. A Friday night at the cinema is probably something many of us do in Wausau, why not do it for free?
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by erik on August 19th, 2008 • 3 Comments »
First of all thanks to everyone who both viewed and voted on our Point Beer Webmercial! We have by far the most views, the most votes and the highest rating, even with some steep competition.
I’ve been glued to Microcosm for the last week. Our Sound Designer stepped down and as such I was thrust into doing the post production audio. With such short notice, this deep into the production and considering our location (Central Wisconsin) we just didn’t have anyone in our network of filmmaking friends that could take that over for us. I have limited experience, but not enough to make it go fast enough. All the same, countless hours after work and over the weekend in the Final Cut Suite have yielded some good results. The rough audio cut is done. I’m having cast and crew listen and give their pair of pennies on it and what we can do to improve.
One thing that needs to improve is our soundtrack. While we have some totally awesome tunes from Vinny Bex Dae, Awesome Car Funmaker, and Ryan and Kaitlin, we could still use just two to three more tracks to really round out the whole thing. Jim Carlson sounds interested and I hope to get some tunes from him soon to see if he’s a good fit for our aesthetic. The other thing we’re doing this weekend is ADR, that is bringing in actors to re-record lines because the sound captured on location is not usable. The cast has not seen each other since production, so I’m excited to get them back in the same room together to get chemistry rocking and rolling again.
We are still having a premiere September 5th! It’s at The University of Wisconsin: Marathon County, in the theater. We get started at 8:30 PM, so I hope to see many of you there! Again, we cannot put this film up in its entirely on the web due to some festivals frowning upon Internet screened films. So if we don’t get into the Central Wisconsin Film Festival, this may be the only public screening of the film in this area for a long time and regardless the only one in Wausau.
In other news I’m looking at shooting a campaign ad soon for a local politician. Until I end my affiliation with the news station I work for, I’m not saying who it is. All the same, I’m excited to be getting straight back into the political process after having to take two years off for the sake of appearing impartial.
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by erik on August 11th, 2008 • 2 Comments »
So I know this has really become the Microcosm blog, but I swear it’s not! Sadly, I have not had much as far as “oh wow!” news stories lately. Nothing I’ve come away from really impressed with anyway. I have covered some pretty amazing stuff though, like Edward Lanphear and the Tomahawk Mill Explosion.
But today I bring you something entirely different. Stop That Nun decided we should enter in a webmercial contest that Point Beer was hosting at the request of Brett Widmann. Brett’s name should be somewhat familiar, he’s the Music Supervisor and an Associate Producer for Microcosm. So Brett, Seth Callaway, Chris Leslie and myself sat down and pitched around ideas and we came away with Seth’s idea for a hot girl in a bikini.
In a room full of bachelors how could that idea not get some sort of traction?
So Brett and Seth offered to Produce the commercial, I tossed in my hat for director and we ran from there. I took Seth’s idea, put it to script and from there Seth and Brett hooked us up with actors and rounded out a crew. We had Seth Gaffing, myself heading up Cinematography, Alex Ackert was my Assistant Camera and Brett got down on doing on-site audio. We cast Brett Gilbertson, who will be in a supporting role for Microcosm, down for starring in the commercial. I love Gibby, if I were staying in the area he would be my the Jason Mewes to my Kevin Smith. Brett brought in Vanessa Derickson-Rivera to be brave enough to done a bikini around an all male crew and in the middle of a small town brewery where you can guess mostly guys work. She was very good to us. Additionally, Brett brought in Aaron Mielke to be the bartender and Luke McCain to be an extra. You can see Seth briefly as both an extra, and his hands bring the beer bottles into frame on the beach.
Seth and Brett did some editing and then I came in to put on final touches like color correction, sound editing and a couple of other quick edits. The result is what I think is a very solid locally produced commercial. Especially since we had no budget what-so-ever. That’s right, this commercial had no money behind it. Imagine what we could do if we could pay people and locations to give a business a commercial. We wouldn’t have to work around schedules either, since we’d be doing this for a living. Not to sound too full of himself, but as someone that has seen a whole lot of local commercials working at a local TV station, I think that we pretty much blow 90% of locally produced commercials out of the water.
But I’ve done enough talking when the final product should really speak for itself, here you go!
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by erik on August 2nd, 2008 • One Comment »
As we hit the home stretch of this production these are the type of updates you’ll be seeing on Microcosm. Stephenie is hard at work on the post production audio now that she has almost every bit of sound captured on location. Brett is trying to get us some more groups on the soundtrack and I’m trying to keep it all together. Actors are coming back in to re-record some dialog. Lucky for Alex all of his audio is clean, but every other person who speaks even one line will have to come back in!
The big news is that we’re adding another group to the already awesome line-up of Ryan and Kaitlin along with Awesome Car Funmaker. Antigo based Vinny Bex Dae will be hooking up with us as well. I’m mulling over exactly which track(s) of there’s will be making an appearance, but I’m really digging them right now and want them on this soundtrack.
In the original “dream soundtrack” I mentioned in my last post I employed eight different groups, which is an insane amount of music for a short. Most feature lengths will get just above that area and Microcosm currently clocks in at 16:20 with end credits. So really with one more group I should be able to completely round out the soundtrack.
All the same, I can’t say I’m surprised that my soundtrack would be really dense. I’m addicted to music something fierce. Just yesterday I waited for compression, FTP transfers and other various necessary evils of editing I just cruised band biographies on Wikipedia. Also, as mentioned back on my old personal blog, the film is very Altman-esque in that it’s a series of connected scenes that have big gaps in time between them. A solid soundtrack helps the audience make that jump and keeps the narrative feeling connected. I’ve also mentioned to folks before that the only reason I want a budget for my films is to pay everyone and to buy the rights to music. I don’t need special effects or anything other than the equipment I’ve scrimped and saved for over the last decade or so. Just give me a good solid soundtrack I’ll make the rest of it happen my own way.
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by erik on July 28th, 2008 • 5 Comments »
So I’m very excited to say that the Madison rock foursome, Awesome Car Funmaker’s “Take It” be in Microcosm. They were part of my “dream soundtrack,” that is when you just wish for the moon to give your crew an idea what you’re looking for, and then work within the means of the production. Thankfully not only is ACF talented, but giving as well. Look for their contribution at the premiere, September 5th, 8:30 PM at the UWMC theater.
Big props to Music Supervisor Brett Widmann for hooking that all up. It’s truly amazing when one can get part of that “dream” line-up in your film. We’re still looking for more groups to give us some different sounds, so if you have any suggestions, let me know.
And if you’re interested in checking out Awesome Car Funmaker, look no further than their MySpace page: http://www.myspace.com/awesomecarfunmaker
Other than that post continues to go well. I really can’t comment much more on it because it’s a bit too much into the process. However, scheduling conflicts may make it impossible for the fine cut to be done for the premiere. So it’ll be a mostly final product, but not quite.
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by erik on July 20th, 2008 • 3 Comments »
So I’ve been back on Pandora lately since I feel my music selection has become a bit stale. May I recommend The Subways to you? I’ve been enjoying them as of late.
This poor neglected blog sadly didn’t have much to say. I did cover the Edward Lanphear craziness in Wisconsin Rapids for days straight. I never quite got a package out of it that I thought was amazing, but I’m thinking of updating my YouTube Channel soon with a lot of stories that have been piling up, waiting for commentary and frankly I’ve been horrible about getting up.
But my days are spent putting my demo reel together for job hunting in the Baltimore area. I posted it on Twitter and the Stop That Nun boards to help me make it better and I got some great feedback from many fine folks. I’m not putting together the DVD of basically my life’s work. It’s crazy to think that everything I’ve done can be put on a 12cm piece of metal and plastic. That’s not entirely true, I’ve done so much news stuff that I haven’t given a second thought about since I handed it over to our production crew to be aired. But there’s still a lot I’m quite proud of.
Speaking of reels and pride. If you search Google for “photojournalist demo reel” guess who’s first.
If you’re looking for Microcosm news, there sadly isn’t much. Stephenie had her first go through on the audio of the film and began to mix it properly. We’ll be bringing in all our leads for some ADR work to make sure both the visuals and audio pops in the audience’s brain. I’m really happy to have Steph working the audio on this one. While I was in school there just weren’t folks with golden ears around looking to do film. We had lots of great cinematographers around, but sound was treated like a red-headed step child. As I type this I’m listening to The Yeah Yeah Yeahs, pretty much anytime I’m doing anything music is playing. Audio is VERY important to me even if I don’t understand most of it.
The other big news that I shouldn’t bury down in the middle of this blog is that we have a premiere date and time! w00t! Sarah Rudolph and Barry Liss over at The University of Wisconsin: Marathon County have been gracious enough to allow us in the Theater at the University. So be there on September 5th, 2008. We start the DVD player a spinning at 8:30 PM, cast and crew will be around afterward to be poked and prodded with questions or if you’re looking for some folks for your next big audio/visual project, look no further than the finest film crew assembled in the Wausau area.
Also this weekend was the last time I will see Margaret until I join her out in Baltimore. Bittersweet to say the least. After she left I immediately went to work on my reel to busy my mind and keep me out of falling into a funk. Two months is a crazy long time to go without seeing someone that important to you. I know, it sounds pathetic, you’ve gone longer, etc. Me too, don’t worry. Doesn’t change the fact that it really sucks.
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by erik on July 9th, 2008 • 6 Comments »
As cliche as it is for an aspiring filmmaker to say it, I will anyway: Stanley Kubrick is my favorite director. It’s not even a competition between him and who could maybe populate that second place spot (David Fincher, The Coen Brothers, Wong Kar Wai, David Lynch and Jim Jarmusch all come to mind). Recently my brother in law shared a link with me about how many of Kubrick’s personal correspondences, notes and other awesome insights into his process were being put on display in The University of Arts in London.
You can read the whole article in the Telegraph.
When I was in college is used to watch a Kubrick film weekly. I own the Stanley Kubrick collection on DVD and all of those films have graced my X-Box more times than I can count. Both A Clockwork Orange and 2001: A Space Odyssey would easily make it in to my top ten favorite films, maybe even top five. I adore this man’s work. He so forces the viewer to gaze upon every facet of humanity with an unblinking eye. His deft examinations of the human condition are more than just stories committed to celluloid, they are philosophical theses, thought experiments and unabashed windows.
Sometimes I just read something that really reminds me why I am so dedicated to this art form. Somewhere between ordering a fish costume on-line and meeting with the City of Wausau one can often forget just what they’re doing in film and focus too much on whether or not it’s noticeable a June bug is flying in your actress’s hair in a given shot.
Luckily articles like this one in the Telegraph, or this profile on Todd Haynes from The New York Times, ignite that spark in me again and remind me that I am a filmmaker because I believe in the power and importance of the medium. I believe this quote from my favorite author, Chuck Palahniuk:
The first step — especially for young people with energy and drive and talent, but not money — the first step to controlling your world is to control your culture. To model and demonstrate the kind of world you demand to live in. To write the books. Make the music. Shoot the films. Paint the art.
I’m thinking it might be a Kubrick night tonight.
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by erik on July 4th, 2008 • 10 Comments »
I’ve been telling a few close friends and casually mentioned it on Twitter a couple of times, but I figure I should make an official post.
I’m leaving you Wausau, it’s not you, it’s me.
In all seriousness it’s a bit of both. I want something Wausau can’t give me: a career in narrative film. While I had a lot of great support from the community to make Microcosm, my landlord just doesn’t take great support to pay the bills. Sadly, I have to go to where the jobs are, where the connections can be made and where I can get paid to get creative rather than spray video. That’s not to say that I haven’t had plenty of opportunities to be creative as a photojournalist. But the jump from photojournalist to filmmaker is nigh impossible, especially in an area in which there are no commercial film or television productions.
In a perfect world Microcosm would play at Sundance or something, and then a studio would ask me how much money I would need to make a feature length. Before you know it I have a payed film crew in Wausau shooting on the streets again, this time with a few more people around and better food then lunch meat in a cooler!
But I’m not about to bank on pure dumb luck getting me where I want to be, and so while I hope Microcosm can be very competitive in Film Festivals, I’m looking ahead to the future.
And for me the future is Baltimore.
Call it a stepping stool or something, but Baltimore is where the big dogs go to avoid the huge expense of shooting in New York. The University of Maryland Baltimore County has a damn fine MFA program in Visual Art, complete with 35mm facilities right on campus. Commercials, music videos, even feature films are all shot in the area. There’s plenty of opportunities for a guy with a camera and work ethic.
And it’s thanks to the Wausau area I’ve got both. The low cost of living in Wausau has allowed me to afford quite a bit on a paltry journalism salary, like a new to me car and a short film production. And growing up not more than thirty miles away on a farm has more than taught me how to work from dawn til dusk.
But I’ll still be around for a little while. As I send out resumes and whatnot my starting date is September 22nd. Which will give me enough time to give proper notice to the news station in town that has given me so much resume padding, sell off what I’m not taking with me, and pack up to head out.
So you all will have to put up with this blog crowding the left side-bar for two more months.
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by erik on July 1st, 2008 • 2 Comments »
Hey all,
So just recently I got a comment on this old video I put up on YouTube a bit over a year ago. It was my original video of location scouting for Microcosm. I looked up on the date of the video and saw I uploaded almost a year to the date before we went into production on it and I started taking a little trip down memory lane.
I used to have a personal blog, but I have sense blocked it from the public as requested by employers. I haven’t updated it since either. But I still have it around for moments like this, I can go back and see where I was and what was happening. My first mention of it comes way back on February 19th of 2007:
I started working more on a short screenplay I’d started a while ago for fun. It doesn’t have a title yet, but it involves Floze of Confab, Wayne Fountain of Walo 2, and Johnny from The Devil’s Dictionary. It’s a prequel of sorts to all there as it deal with them going to high school together and their last night in their small town before they all head off to college. They want to leave a mark on this town, someway they can always be remembered. Some way of attaining immortality. It’s a comedy to be certain, but I’m using the microcosm of life in general.
After watching Full Metal Jacket with Kim yesterday I got even more inspired to chisel away at it. Much like Full Metal Jacket, I want to very much use the three principle characters, and many of the side ones as well, as representatives of a whole generation of people growing up in our society today. It’s a little Fight Club to be certain, but that movie is such a large part of my life, I’d wager anything I write has a little Fight Club in it!
I honestly couldn’t tell you how much I had been working on that guy before then. I don’t believe it was too terribly long. Looking around that post the big things in my life were that I was still addicted to World of Warcraft, Luke was off in London and I was just breaking up with my first real “post college” girlfriend.
By March 14th I had begun to make Microcosm as “Wausau” film:
After work I took a walk around downtown for a while. There’s a lot of really great places in the downtown area that could look visually provocative.
This, in turn, has been fueling my latest attempt at a screenplay. I mentioned it earlier and it’s evolved a bit since then. It’s still about some dudes looking for something, anything really, during the last night they’re spending in a small town before going off to college. I changed the characters a bit, now it features Milo and Floze of Confab fame and a new character I wrote specifically for the screenplay. The themes are still the same, but I think the humor is a bit tighter and controlled. I’m writing it as a possible entry for Stop That Nun’s next picture. Unlike other stuff I’ve written in the past (aside from Forfeit) which could take place in Anytown, USA, this one is a Wausau film. It takes place in specific locations in the city and will hopefully have a central Wisconsin feel over all.
I figure I should take advantage of what this area has to offer while I’m here. Much like with Forfeit, I don’t want to pretend I’m not in Wisconsin when I am. There’s an obsession with many small time filmmakers to try to be as Hollywood as much as possible. I want to use what I have, the organic feel of Wausau might not feel like much to many of us from the area, but Wausau, like any city, has a tone. This screenplay is looking to embrace and show the tone.
I’m also writing it a bit like an Altman film: a series of connected scenes that feature the same characters. There’s no direct continuity between the scenes or anything like that, I tossed the three act structure out, along with other traditional narrative devices. I want it to feel serialized in a way. Much like what life feels like: a series of events, connected, but not working towards just one particular climax. Since the film is a metaphor of life in general, this is very purposeful, but also quite fun and different for me.
This will also keep scheduling easy and the budget low. A huge plus for any indie shoot.
So we’ll see if the Nuns choose it soon. Regardless, I’m really looking forward to do another actual film shoot. Confab and it’s run and gun mentality just never sat right with me, no lighting set-ups of any kind, all handheld shots… I mean that was partially due to aesthetics, but also due to limitations. I miss being on a traditional film set quite a bit. Whatever we choose to do, it’ll be damn fun and I look forward to Stop That Nun putting out something we can be proud of again.
Today I’m going to work on the second draft of the screenplay by taking my laptop out to the locations I have in mind for the scenes and writing them from there. Cheesy, maybe, but I like the sound of it already and I want to take advantage of this sudden amazing weather we’re having in Wisconsin while it lasts!
March 24th I made quick mention that I had stopped the film being related to Stop That Nun and Stevens Point Television’s failed attempt at a sitcom: Confab. So Milo and Floze stopped being those characters and evolved to what would eventually become Mikel (Luke Cieslewicz) and Zaki (Joel Heimerman).
On June 13th I started putting up stills from my initial location scouting, it’s the same trip that took me out to get that video that started this post. There were some locations that stayed very much the same, changed to different spots, or were cut out of the script long before we started scouting.
A year ago today I was complaining the script was too long. It’s still too long. The rough cut is running around 18 minutes, credits included. I need that to be about 3 minutes smaller. Curse you past Erik for not putting more effort into trimming! Not long thereafter I complained some more about the length and even the titled, which I ended up keeping.
On July 17th I officially called for the beginning of preproduction, even though scouting is obviously a part of that process. The script was 25 pages and I describes the plot in the following way:
Microcosm will be a short dramedy following two college freshman the last day of summer before they start school: Mikel an all too typical guy who pined over would-be actress Ireland for the better part of their high school lives. Production is scheduled for Summer of 2008, for this Stop That Nun production directed by Erik Cieslewicz.
So yeah for hitting the target time! A little under a year ago I said I wanted to be shooting a film and bam, we did it. At the time of that entry I didn’t even have Seth Callaway or Chris Leslie on as co-Producers with me, although I had already committed to producing and directing. Amusingly, I mentioned I was looking for a cinematographer in that post and I didn’t get one locked down until May 4th of this year!
This post generally shows how excited I was as a rebel without a crew and a clunky script back on July 18th:
It’s been over a year now since I have been on a film shoot proper, and that was for Holy Chip! There are few times in my life I’ve been more happy then when we pulled off the closing shot of Forfeit, or on the balcony for The Devil’s Dictionary.
Watching a film come together on set is something that can’t be explained; it just simply is.
Microcosm is coming together really well. The script makes me really happy; it obviously still needs a lot of work, but it says a lot of things I want to convey via the medium. There’s already a lot of images bumping around in my brain for this one. I want to play with color temperature quite a bit with this one. One of the great advantages of working with video is that you can change around what type of lighting your “stock” is made for on a dime instead of having to swap out film.
So I want to take advantage of that as much as possible.
I want another stellar cast to work with too. While Holy Chip! was fun, there was something magic about the folks I got together for The Devil’s Dictionary. I want that same general feel from Microcosm. Working with a great cast is one of the best parts about directing.
So yeah, to say I’m pumped is to put it mildly. I really can’t wait to start rehearsals, to shoot a teaser trailer, to pick out costumes… I’m getting giddy just typing all this up. I’m excited to see just what being a photo-journalist has done to my feel for visual aesthetics on the screen, I think it’s going to effect my framing, composition and shot choice a lot. Editing I think I’m going to get a shorter attention span and look for more inserts both in my shot list and in the editing room.
And I’m excited to get other people in the artistic vision besides myself. I want to see what a cinematographer will do with this script, I’m dying to see the typing of pacing and shot choices that an editor will bring in. Just how the audio will be mixed, ADR’d, recorded on set and generally done. I’ve got costumes written into the script that best say what I want the character to look like, but what costumes will create this look? I’ll be looking to my Art Director to help me find that.
Good times ahead.
A lot of that really came together for me. I did have a stellar cast, whether it was Arwen Fonzen, Joel and Alex Mace who are being groomed at the stellar UWSP BFA program, Brett Gilbertson whose role was practically written for him, Luke who people can cry nepotism about all day, but any kid that goes to Notre Dame on a scholarship is probably pretty good at his craft or the last minute casting of Chris Leslie when my actor backed out of the production the day of shooting his scene.
I have been playing a lot with saturation and color temperature in the edit room. That visions stayed in tact all the months we waited for production. Sadly, I never did find an Art Director for this shoot which I still see as a wasted opportunity. Somewhere there must have been a Theater Tech person or a great Visual Artist that was looking for a shot at film and we just never connected. I tried, sending feelers out to UWSP and UW Oshkosh as well as calling for it in public forums and asking other cast and crew if they knew of anyone.
Oh well, I art directed this one with the help of pretty much everyone on set. Multitasking is the name of the game when it comes to no-budget filmmaking.
On July 27th I added Seth to the crew as a producer. I was posting the script readily on the blog for anyone and everyone to read and give feedback on.
The day after my birthday I added Chris as the other producer. My love life was on an up swing (that wouldn’t last too long really), I was cast in the UWMC of Dead Man Walking and I was taking my first business trip: out to Ames, Iowa to cover the Republican Straw poll when Tommy Thompson was still in the race.
My last post on that blog came with talk of work on the 5th draft and Dead Man Walking going up in about a week.
I started up a new blog that was a more professional, less personal blog which eventually became what you’re reading right now. You can see on October 7th I finished that fifth draft and was still pleading for people to read and fire back comments.
After that I was under the radar with publicly talking about the film. Not until the sixth draft was complete and I was calling for folks to come by and auditions did I return, and that’s all right here on the CW.
That was a nice little trip down memory lane. With this week off I do have a little time to reflect on how we got to where we are. And a lot of that was ground work laid a year and a half ago. Just crazy. Hopefully the time and effort shows in the final product.
And hopefully you’re there to tell me.
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by erik on June 30th, 2008 • No Comments »
This past Saturday Seth Callaway and I finished a rough cut of Microcosm. It was a pretty big moment for us. One can actually watch the film from start to finish and get a general idea of flow. Producer Chris Leslie and actor Luke Cieslewicz have already weighed in quite a bit on the cut and I already have some ideas for relieving some of their worries. Moreover they gave me a lot of positive feedback, which is equally important.
I know what you’re thinking, everyone needs a little ego stroke and that’s what you’re looking for. Well, maybe 
But more than that, sometimes when you live with a script as long as I have you start forgetting that at one point you found the jokes amusing, the moments fresh and the drama real. You start to doubt pretty much everything you’re doing because it doesn’t have that same impact it did the first time you thought about it.
There are some things, like the last shot of the piece, that I’m fairly certain will look good to me no matter how many times I see it. But that’s an exception to be certain. So while I want to hear all the ways we can make this film the best work it possibly can be, and that’s by far the best feedback I receive, it is nice to be reassured that what I’m doing is still as fun as I remember it being a year ago when I wrote it!
I’m glad I’ve got Microcosm taking up most of my free time because my work at the station hasn’t been YouTube worthy as of late. I just haven’t been getting some nice feature stories that I can really sink my teeth into. A lot of breaking news coverage, live shots and public service announcement type stories have been the bulk of everyone’s work lately. And with talk of trying a live shot every day, that trend could continue. But sweeps are on the horizon (already!) and so I’ve high hopes for something new.
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