3 DAYS BLIND day to day activity

Friday 9 January 2009 - MIX BEGINS:
Today, we start mixing the show. All the foley, sound effects, dialogue, ADR, and music are combined and set at levels that are chosen initially by the mixers, Melissa Ellis and Fil Brown at Advantage Audio. Then, Clete and I will go through and make our tweaks and changes. Melissa and Fil have mixed everthing we have created. Seven years ago they mixed our movie INSTANT TRAUMA. We owe a debt of gratitude to my long time friend, Jim Hodson, President of Advantage Audio, and the entire staff.

They have done an outstanding job and have put up with my extreme attention to detail with... grace. I applaud them all for their tolerance. I LOVE THESE PEOPLE! Depending on how pickey Clete and I are - and how long they will let us "play", we will be finished by the end of next week.

Wednesday 8 January 2009 - COLOR CORRECTION FINISHES:
We finished the color correction today. Little did I know, Philip put many hours into our show making it the best possible. He was great to work with and we had many laughs in the bay. It's all about the work... but fun counts just as much! Thanks to Philip for a job well done!

Friday 26 December 2008 - COLOR CORRECTION STARTS:
Today is the first day of color correction on 3 DAYS BLIND. Philip Miller is the colorist working at L.A. Digital. To keep us on schedule, Philip is coming in the day after Christmas! I've said it before, L.A. Digital and the people they employ are first class and damn good people. We could never have completed this project without Gary Migdal and his company.

Thursday 27 November 2008 - MUSIC COMPOSITION IS STARTING AND VISUAL EFFECTS ARE ALMOST COMPLETED:
3 DAYS BLIND is now entering a final phase of activity. After this Thanksgiving weekend, our composer, Robert Irving and our Music Supervisor, Mark Watters will be able to devote their efforts full time to 3 DAYS BLIND. To date, we have submitted 3 DAYS BLIND (as a "work in progress") to several Film festivals: SXSW (Austin, TX), AFI-DALLAS, ATLANTA, NEWPORT BEACH, SANTA BARBARA, FLORIDA, TRIBECA (New York), and the WORLD OF COMEDY FILM FESTIVAL in Toronto. We won't know for several weeks if we are an "official selection", meaning... WE GOT ACCEPTED, but we do have high hopes!

The approximately 35 visual effects shots should be completed this weekend and viewed on a large screen early next week (if all goes according to plan). So, it all seems to be coming together. These are really shots which might have had the boom mic enter frame, or in one case, as the actor was talking, something dropped from a tree. The falling object is very distracting so... we just take it out! :)

Our search continues for a Cast/Crew/Friends screening venue. As soon as we have the theater and date locked in, there will be information on this web site for attending.

Next up with be our ADR (the 9th of December) which is simply replacing dialogue that is hard to hear, or there was something wrong with the original recording and we have to re-record the dialogue. Then we will Online and Color Correct. More about that upcoming.

PLEASE KEEP CHECKING BACK TO OUR WEB SITE FOR INFORMATION REGARDING OUR JANUARY CAST / CREW / FRIENDS SCREENING!

Sunday 26 October 2008 - 3 DAYS BLIND IS OFFICIALLY LOCKED:
What this means is the picture editing for this movie is completed. It took approx. 10 weeks for me to edit the picture. I'm not that fast but both Clete and I are very happy with the result. This week was a true test since I had to lock picture by today, Sunday. We encountered a technical problem that almost forced us to miss our deadline. We were down for almost 2 full days. Once again, Gary Migdal and L.A. Digital came to the rescue, solved my dilemma and we are able to make our deadline.

Tomorrow Clete and I will attend a spotting session for sound effects. I'm creating a QuickTime of our movie, with visable time code, and Monday morning at Advantage Audio we will go through the entire movie with selected Advantage Audio staff (headed up by Jim Hodson, and who are GREAT to work with by the way). We basically "spot" where we would like sound effects added. For example, there is a scene where we might want to add a police car siren where one does not exist. Stuff like that. It's a lot of fun to see the movie start to fill out with sound. I've worked with Advantage Audio for years and they are top notch. Great bunch of hard workers who really care about their work. I am very grateful they are working on our movie.

We're getting closer to obtaining a screening date. Hopefully it will be in January and we'll have a LARGE theater. We had 500 people show 5 years ago when we screened INSTANT TRAUMA, and hopefully we will have another crowd!

I will try to post more pictures once I can figure out how to make the pages the way I want. I'm a slow film editor but I'm REALLY SLOW when it comes to trying to modify our web site! GEEEEEEEZZZEEEE, GIVE ME A BREAK!

PLEASE KEEP CHECKING BACK TO OUR WEB SITE FOR INFORMATION REGARDING OUR JANUARY CAST / CREW / FRIENDS SCREENING!

Monday 13 October 2008 - TEST SCREENING AT SONY STUDIOS:
Other than Clete and myself, this is the first time anyone has seen a complete cut of 3 DAYS BLIND. Art Bergel, our executive producer couldn't join us, but Susan Fowler, our associate producer, flew in from Houston, TX to attend our first cut. She was very happy with the results, had only compliments, and flew back to Texas.

It was nerve racking to say the least but if you want feedback, there has to be an audience. We tried to invite mostly people we don't know, friends of friends, so we can get honest feedback. Well, it is difficult enough just to get people to go to Culver City on a Monday at 6:30, but to have the horrific traffic problems, prompted by all the fires, was nearly impossible. Two people couldn't make it because they had to evacuate their mom out of the fire zone in Northridge.

So, we showed the movie and even in it's rough form (very little music, rough sound, no sound effects, it wasn't mixed, etc.) there was laughter from start to finish. Then, we handed out a 2 sided questionaire and asked them to fill them out, don't sign them, and be brutally honest... otherwise what's the point? The consenses was very positive. We have a few minor changes, which should be completed in approx. a week, and then we're off to the races!

Once we lock the cut (no more changes) and turn it over to my mix house, Advantage Audio, who are fabulous and will do a great job for us. At the same time, there are some removals (unwanted boom mics and such) which need to be started as well. All in all we are on schedule and on budget. I'll touch base soon.

PLEASE KEEP CHECKING BACK TO OUR WEB SITE FOR INFORMATION REGARDING OUR JANUARY CAST / CREW / FRIENDS SCREENING!

Monday 11 August 2008 - Wrap day:
Well, as things happen, it was waaaaaaay too hard to keep up the "day to day activity" that I thought would be so much fun. Next time, I'll have an intern do a day to day so that we can keep up with it. We finished yesterday, Sunday 10 August 2008 and today was the day for returning camera gear, walkie talkies, rental cars and picture cars. But, we came in on time and on budget. We all feel good about that!
Click here for Summary of shoot and production photos!

Saturday 19 July 2008 - DAY 1 (ahhhhh, we made it through day one):
First day of shoot was fun but tough. I met craft service at the location at 5:45 a.m., let her in, and started to help her unload. I immediately dropped a large bag of ice on my foot! She looks at me and says, "Not a good way to start the day." Yeah, no kidding. All and all it went well for the chaos of a first day shoot. Steve, the line producer, and I shuttled people to and from the location. Steve's a real trooper, I tell ya. The crew is fairly small... consequently we are all trying to do everything. Clete is fantastic on the set; very positive, energetic, and focused on performance. I am very proud of him! Art, our financial backer was on set today and seemed to enjoy himself. Everyone should be so lucky to work with a guy like Art. I'll have pictures up sometime soon and I will post them every day if possible. Anyway, thanks for reading. Till tomorrow, your 3 DAYS BLIND Producer, Chris.

Thursday 20 March 2008 - Back on track!:
After nearly a year of delay, Those Keith Brothers are ready to re-start. Our plan is to shoot 3 DAYS BLIND this July. We are beginning to line up actors, create the schedule/budget, make contacts for crew and locate the necessary resources. This comedy will take a lot of effort on everyone's part to make it happen. Remember, "Comedy is simply a funny way of being serious." - Peter Ustinov