Well, that's just about it for 2012.  It's been a heck of a year for me.  Of course, I directed my first feature this year -- BLACK PAPER.  Post-production is coming along quite well, and you can watch the teaser trailer here.  But lots of other great things happened this year, too.

In January, Ryan Leeder and I signed an option for a feature screenplay we'd written called THE BOILING POINT.  We're still waiting for the film to be shot, but it's great to have an option.  Also in January, I directed VANISHING ACT, which I consider my best short film.  It played at the East Lansing Film Festival in November, and it's been sent to lots more festivals.

This summer saw the launch of the first Hank Danger radio play -- HANK DANGER AND THE ISLAND OF FIRE!

To top it all off, December 13 marked the twentieth anniversary of the making of my very first short film.  Back in September, I hosted a retrospective screening of some of my work to celebrate that milestone.

So all in all, 2012 has been a great year for me.  I hope it's be great for you too.  I couldn't have accomplished what I did without all the other people involved in those various projects.  You know who you are, and you're amazing.  Here's to 2013 (and the release of BLACK PAPER)!

Chuck's Boy is pleased to announce the release of the official BLACK PAPER teaser trailer!  Happy Christmas!

Over the weekend, I finished editing the rough cut of BLACK PAPER!  It's currently about 90 minutes long, but that will probably change a little as I fine-tune the cut.

I'm also working on color correction at the moment.  The film's in black & white, but some of the footage came out a little dark, so I need to brighten it up and make sure it's all consistent.  I've been testing that stuff out on the teaser trailer.  It's not ready for release yet, but it's getting close.  Composer Chris Porter sent me a draft of the teaser's score this week, and it sounds amazing.  He has a solid understanding of the film's aesthetic, and the music clearly reflects that.

On the whole, I'm quite pleased with the film right now.  It's nowhere near finished, but I'm confident that it's going to be a nice piece of independent cinema.

Well, all the footage has been converted into a usable file type, and after two weeks of work, all the audio has been synchronized with the picture.  So now, I'm editing the rough cut of BLACK PAPER.

For those of you unfamiliar with the post-production process for motion pictures, allow me to explain.  During production, we shoot lots of footage of all the scenes.  Then, an editor (in this case, me) has to assemble all the appropriate pieces of footage into a coherent movie.

Sometimes the pieces fit together very well.  Other times, there are issues that make the puzzle a little trickier.  For instance, if someone's hand is positioned a certain way in one shot, but is positioned differently in the next shot.  That leads to what's called a continuity error.  The editor has to try to cut down on those.  If the script supervisor has done a good job on set, there shouldn't be too many continuity errors to worry about in post.

The editor also controls the pacing of the film.  If I want a certain moment to play out a little longer on screen than it did on set, I can find ways to manipulate the timing of the footage to that effect.

The rough cut is the first edited version of the film.  It's not polished or finished, but it gives the filmmakers an idea of what the finished picture will look and feel like.  Sometimes the rough cut is very different than the finished product.  For example, when Joseph Stefano, the screenwriter of Alfred Hitchcock's PSYCHO, saw the rough cut of that film, he thought it was the worst thing he'd ever seen.  But that was just the rough cut.

Once the film is edited and polished, it undergoes a process called color correction.  In the case of BLACK PAPER, that means that the entire film will be converted to black & white and the contrasts will be adjusted.  The film's sound will also need to be edited and mixed so that different audio tracks are set at the appropriate relative levels.  And to top it all off, a composer will write music to score the film.  We have a very gifted composer on board for that: Chris Porter, with whom I've worked many times.

So right now I'm on the first step: the rough cut.  I'm almost twenty minutes into the picture already, and it's not the worst thing I've ever seen.  In fact, I think it's pretty good.  But then, I am a little biased.