The Atheist Movie Journal

Shooting is done!

Well, I'm sitting at my computer, it's 1:15 in the morning, editing away. This to me is the fun part. For a movie to come out sort of neat, a couple of minutes of film can take days of editing.

There are two parts to this movie. The first is more dynamic. It's fast, zippy-dy-zap, back and forth. The second half is the heaven scene. This part is more didactic, a tiny bit slower, but nonetheless, I have to say, the acting is superb, very well done thanks to Mike and Konrad.

I'm hoping to have this all done in another week or so. Until then, here's a little taste of the heaven scene. This isn't the final look at all, I just put it together quickly for a preview with no blurs, glows, or any other effects. Enjoy.

The amazing stunt team

This was perhaps one of the most fun days of shooting so far, the accident scene, shot in downtown Honolulu. Everyone was fabulous, and even though I don't show everyone but the three stunt guys, I can't forget all who were very helpful: my wife Grace, of course, Mike who's developing into an amazing actor, Laura, Craig, Paul, Josh and Savannah (who shot the behind the scenes footage).

More to come!

Mike Devenny's Blog

Today was a very productive day! It started with a one hour walk, in the hot sun, to break in the bus pass that Tony and Grace found me. Once I got to Tony’s, he and Grace made an awesome lunch! Our first shot of the day was the wedding. Not bad, I’ve been on the island for 2 months, and I’m already getting married! We had a few churches in mind to shoot in front of. Some of the ladies on the set decided to ask for permission to shoot at the church across the street from the apartment, and luckily they agreed. The church had a beautiful courtyard with a fountain. The sun was great, and we got some great shots.

But sadly…I haven’t seen or spoken to my “on screen wife” since that day. I think we’re going to end up “seeing other on screen people”.

Immediately after the rice was thrown and Tony yelled, “That’s a wrap”. Laura & I headed back to the apartment to apply my horrendously abused makeup. Laura did the amazingist job she’s done so far. (That’s right, it was so good I had to make up a word.) The next shot we decided to tackle, was an artistic idea that Tony had. I don’t want to give away any details, but it involved James driving the truck around the block, me laying in the bed with my head hanging over the tailgate, Tony crouching over me with the camera, and Grace sitting on my leg and holding Tony’s shirt. It was scary, nerve-racking, and awesome all at once.

James took Laura home, and the rest of us were pretty exhausted. We thought about calling it a wrap for the day, but we didn’t want to waste time with good makeup. So we shot the hospital bed scene. Grace bandaged up my wounds, like any good nurse would do. But the real pain came from the chopped onions that I rubbed under my eyes to produce some tears. It worked well…a little to well! For a hospital gown, we took the shirt of a set of scrubs and cut it right down the front. I put it on backwards, and it was wide open in the back. Tony put on a full set of scrubs for moral support. It’s a shame he wasn’t on screen with the scrubs on, because he looked awesome! So awesome in fact, he kept the scrubs on to go shot me walking on the pier.

We realized there weren’t any transition shots between the hospital bed and me and James in Waikiki. So we got a few shots of me taking my crutches for a ride on the pier. We got some great shots, and were really exited about the volume of footage we pulled out of the day. So we rewarded ourselves with homemade steaks! Not only can Tony direct…he can cook!

Hey, thanks, Mike, I appreciate it. But you remind me of the latin word for the coyote from the Road Runner cartoon, Coyote: eatubus almost anythingus. So that's not saying much for my cooking...

The Laura Ferreri Tritube Video

Ladies and gentlemen, Laura Ferreri... enjoy.

Finally some internal shots!

After so much shooting outside, having to configure the iris, filters and so forth, nothing like a totally light and atmosphere manipulatable internal shot.

These are flash back scenes Jeremy is having while in his apartment. Craig Graham was very kind to support us by allowing us to use his apartment.

The epiphany of the evening (: a sudden, intuitive perception of or insight into the reality or essential meaning of something, usually initiated by some simple, homely, or commonplace occurrence or experience. Webster's Dictionary.) was Laura discovering for the first time that she had been brainwashed in believing her eyes were brown when in all reality, they are green. It was a shock for the whole cast/crew.

Click on the eye to look deep inside it. Window to Laura's soul...

This eye made me think for a minute, back to a fantastic book I read last year entitled "Darwin's Black Box", by Michael Behe. Mr. Behe is every atheist's nightmare, and they try very, very hard to discredit him as a scientist, but the facts are in: he is a professor of biological sciences at Lehigh University and taken very seriously by his colleges. Point is, he coined an interesting phrase, "irreducibly complex". What this means is that biological systems are much too complex to have evolved from simpler predecessors. A classic illustration he gives is a mouse trap. You look at a mouse trap and you see all of its components. The board, the spring, the bait holder and so forth. The mouse trap works as a whole. If you are to take one part out of it, the whole mechanism fails. Without the spring, for example, it's not a mouse trap anymore. Well, how could these parts have "evolved", little by little, by time and chance, and lots of time and chance, to get it working perfectly? Which came first? In a living organism, which came first, the lungs or the veins? All biological systems are much too complex to have evolved, yet this is taught in classrooms as science and not a "not yet proven" theory. Yes, I know this is a bit controversial, but the human eye is one of the most irreducibly complex biological systems in the universe. One part cannot work without the other, or have "arrived" in a functional sense without the other. Just by looking deep into this picture, I am amazed at how intrinsically and wonderfully made Laura's eye is. It keeps me in awe.

November 11, 2007

This was a very technical shot, scene number 14, the internal ambulance shot. Let me first lay down some stills and then I'll talk about our shooting experience.

This is the "before" shots, with color correction, bleach bypass and contrast added.

I guess the very first thing to say is about Laura's make up. Unbelievable. It was so realistic, and so well done, that some of us that were there at times would ask Mike if he was really all right. The reason is because he had a neck imobilizer on, was lying down in character the whole time, never smiled or anything like that, and just lied there, with his eyes rolling up. At times Grace would ask, "Mike, are you alright?" It was a freaky experience. Laura was amaaaaaaaaazing. Don, our DP, gave some ideas for lighting, and stood by the lights raising up and down a reflector to give the idea of the ambulance passing under bridges and whatnot. That looked really sweet as well. Grace gave the idea of a slight camera shake to give the illusion of a moving vehicle, so it all came together extremely well. I'm very pleased with the results!

November 3, 2007 - Day 1

The very first thing I want to say about day one is that I had a blast. It was loads of fun, the energy was extremely high, every one was working high paced, and the actors were cool and performed brilliantly.The day started in my apartment at 2:45 pm. Mike arrived and we went over some lines. Then Laura arrived at around 2:45 along with Josh, the script supervisor, and started putting make up on Mike. The whole make up process took about 45 minutes.

Laura working on Mike to make him look a week after the accident.We arrived at Waikiki around 4 o'clock p.m and started to set up everything. Don (DP), Mark (sound), Josh (script supervisor) Grace (prod.) and I set up for the opening and closing scenes of the movie.

DVX100A with Brevis35 adapter and Nikon 50mm lenses on tripod and dolly over PVC tracks. Setting up LCD screens.

Laura: final touch ups.

Examining her work, which looked pretty good.Setting up the first shot.

Mike was prepared, delivered well:

Action!

Preparing the crane shot:

Either James or Traci took this extraordinary picture of our crane shot. It really looked great! We were just waiting for the sun to hit the perfect spot.