Learning to After Effects like a boss

My artwork from The Spider's Nest featuring the novel Pandora

I've been working like crazy to get the artwork done for the next episode of "The Spider's Nest" done, but all I can keep thinking about is how much cooler everything would be if it were even lightly animated. You know, motion comic style.

Zac Gorman’s Legendary ‘Zelda’ Comics Get Their Animated GIF

Because up until now I've always had to shop out any animating needed for the web-series and channel. But I keep hearing that after effects and photoshop aren't so different. So I've been hunting around for some tutorials on how to start using the program and I 'm posting my favorite ones here so I can reference them later. And hey, maybe we can become baller after effects artists together. Why not?

Also I found this really cool site that I'm posting here to return to once I've got my sea legs. Because I want to be able to do the things this guys does someday.

http://www.videocopilot.net/tutorials/

HowTo: Fake Drugs On Screen

My fellow designer and friend Mary Paul sent me a link to this incredible article about what stand in products props masters use when drugs are taken on screen. I've pulled the basic info out into a neat and tidy list for future reference, but here is the link to the original article:

http://nypost.com/2013/10/23/what-actors-really-snort-shoot-and-smoke-on-set/

Cocaine 
Sitting on a table or in lines:
Corn starch and baby powder

Snorted:
Powdered Lactose or Vitamin B powder

Protect the Actor's nasal cavities from multiple takes:
Coat the inside of the straw with Vaseline, so most of the powder gets caught before it gets inhaled

Heroine

Powdered:

The same recipe for faux-caine will work

Boiled:

Sugar and baking soda,

or Bouillon 

or Gelatin

Retracting Needle or Stunt Needle

Rent or Purchase:

http://www.thespecialistsltd.com/stunt-kit-retractable-hypodermic-needle - I've used their kit before and it worked spectacularly - I highly reccomend this if you have the budget for it

http://www.newrulefx.com/products/retractable-syringe-needle - I haven't tried their needle specifically, but I have purchased other stunt props from them in the past and I am always pleased with the quality of their products and their customer service.

Marijuana

Entirely fake:

Oregano

THC free, but otherwise, the real thing:

Buy the real thing without getting the actors high with product bought on legalbuds.com. 

Dress that Bong:

Add coca-cola to the water to dirty it up, add crushed cigarette flakes to float in top.

Ecstasy

Purchase: 

Apparently you can buy stamped sugar pills from a prop house, but I have yet to find the prop house. I'll update this post once I figure it out. Otherwise people recommend Altoids or some other candy with food coloring stamped on it.

Crack Rocks

Not to ingest:

Krazy glue dropped into a pile of baking soda

Magic Mushrooms

Safe to ingest:

Purchase some freeze dried mushrooms from your local asian market

Happy propping everyone!

  

Long time no see

Hello Artful Pursuiters!

Sorry for the hiatus, I've been mildly obsessed with my horror themed blog lately - horrormade.blogspot.com - But now that 2015 has arrived I'm back into the land of writing here as well. I'm aiming to have a new post up every week. I haven't decided which day yet, but I'll keep you in the loop.

For this upcoming year I plan to use this blog to post even more about the how-tos of the filming world, but I am going to start branching out a teensy bit from the holy house of art department and allow a few more aspects of my film-making interests into the mix. More about photography, editing, and sound design for starters. But the production design, and explorations into digital design will continue as well. My work-life in the non-digital world has become a little more diverse lately because Alexander and I have fully embarked on creating our own production company, and finally launched our Haunting TV YouTube channel and all-original web-series.

It's been a ton of fun so far, doing reviews, covering concerts, and I'm especially proud of my book excerpt and author spotlight show The Spider's Nest. So now that I'm apparently morphing into the skin of a producer my interests have started to grow even more.

So, stay tuned to hear more about my adventures in the land of  YouTube and entrepreneurship. :-)

New Blog

Hello my lovey readers,

Lately I've been delving deeper and deeper into all thing horror, and I feel like this blog is more about my specific random adventures in the art world and artistic musings. So I'm starting a new side blog which will branch off into more of my obsessions with the macabre and continue this blog on the more upbeat side of things.

So, if you are like me, and enjoy the dark side, come on over to Horror Made. Which will feature posts about horror in movies, books, comics, art, and how gore and monsters are made for film.

More soon :-)

Damned Connecticut

While researching for a script I'm working on I was lead to the coolest local legend site:

Damned Connecticut is absolutely fascinating. It delves into the hidden, haunted and creepy corners of the state. One of my favorite articles so far is the "Top 10 Ghosts of CT" -- which you can read the whole article by clicking here

New London Ledge Lighthouse

It goes through all my favorites, from the haunted New London Ledge Lighthouse to Annabelle the possessed Raggedy Ann Doll housed in the Warrens' Occult museum in Monroe.

Annabelle and Lorraine Warren

I'll most certainly be frequenting this site as I get deeper into my research.

Call for Art

Hello Folks!

I'm co-curating a monster themed art show this October and I'm looking for artwork, so, contact me if you're interested in submitting ;-)

Pin up art

A little art for funzies :-)