Despite the release of a man-made virus and a series of ensuing tyrannical lockdowns that have destroyed a stunning 60% of all small businesses in the United States (CNBC, Sept. 2020), Psychicflyingmonkey Productions kept forging ahead and made significant accomplishments this year. Read on to find out what we were up to month by month.
by Jason Ryan
February
As I related in my 2019 year end wrap up, I was hired late last year by Blare Media to direct and DP a music video for Ava Terry’s “You”. Ava is only 16 but has a very strong voice, and it was a pleasure working with her and her team. The video was released in February and you can check it out in our MUSIC VIDEOS.
And here’s a behind-the-scenes look at the shoot:
You can count on one hand the number of TV shows that have come out of Arizona in the past many years. And you can count on a baby’s hand the ones that were actually high quality, funny and well-distributed. I was brought on as a cinematographer for the television show Horse Camp, which is shot in the Prescott area with all Arizona crew and mostly Arizona cast. Horse Camp is a new western-comedy TV series that depicts the everyday lives of the dysfunctional ranch hands working at a dude ranch in Arizona. Creator/director Patrick Ball has created a genuinely hilarious and quirky series that I expect will gain an immediate audience upon release.
Check out a sweet trailer for Horse Camp in our SHORT FILMS & TRAILERS.
March
Ah, March. So I was shooting Horse Camp for the first week and a half of March, then my fiance’ and I headed up north to Page, Arizona for a birthday/anniversary trip. Many national parks, monuments, attractions and restaurants started to close as we were up there, so we were limited on what we got to see but still had a great time. We came back home to complete lockdown, so I figured I’d take the next two weeks to repair some of my lighting gear and perform some badly needed updates on my IMDB account. The electrical repairs were easy, the IMDB update was not. It took me a couple full days of work, and I had to consolidate 3 pages into one, but I finally got all the credit I was due for the work I’ve done on various films and TV shows. Check out the results by clicking on the IMDb logo below.
Pro tip: Actors and crew members don’t need IMDB Pro to list a project, get credit for projects they’ve worked on, or to consolidate pages. All you have to do is start your own free IMDB account. In fact, I found that the only thing IMDB Pro is good for as far as one’s personal page is concerned is that if you’re a paying member, it lets you display a profile picture and arrange the order you want for your “Known For” posters that appear at the top of your page. Of course Pro is also necessary if you want to get more in-depth details and contact information about other productions and filmmakers.
May
Being annoyed by the implementation of martial law by Lil’ Dougy Ducey, I jumped at the chance to protest his declaration of martial law at a rally at the Arizona State Capitol on May 3rd. I had planned just to wave a sign the whole time, but I was so inspired I knew I had to document the rally. I conducted interviews and shot b-roll, and edited it together over the course of a week. Check out my short doc on the May 3rd Arizona Lockdown Protest here:
June
I was asked by Nick LaRovere if I would write a piece on hiring a cinematographer for his website, Totalstoryteller.com
Check it out here:
July
As is usual due to the intense Arizona heat, not much happened during July. So here’s a photo I’m rather fond of that I took of my cat, Daisy.
August
I decided to try my hand at action sports self-photography. I had been particularly enjoying one-foot tables on the hip at Sedona skatepark as of late. Since I have the 4K Blackmagic Pocket Cinema Camera, I was able to shoot video of myself in 4K, set a narrow shutter angle and pull a still out. After some grading, here’s the result.
I also finally started organizing footage and editing Out of the Loop: The Jose Yanez Documentary. I had wanted to bring on an assistant editor, but realized it would take so much time for me to organize all my footage to ready it for an assistant editor, that I would become the assistant and the editor I hired would effectively become the main editor. This will be my first full-length documentary, so I knew I had to bite the bullet and do all the editing myself. Check out a teaser trailer for Out of the Loop: The Jose Yanez Documentary in our SHORT FILMS & TRAILERS.
September
In my 2019 year-end wrap up, I wrote about the short film I lensed entitled “The Right Vintage” towards the end of last year. Director Trace Winter decided to write a new ending to the film, so we shot the final scene in September. Trace chose the location for the final scene, and while I loved the design of this house, I wanted to bring more dimension and drama to it to better fit the script. Here’s a breakdown of how we solved the problem:
The main elements of art are color, line, shape, form, and texture. Originally the director wanted to shoot this exterior during the day, but I knew that if we shot this at night, I could do much more vis-à-vis lighting to accent each element, especially color and texture. I could also direct the viewer’s eye where I wanted it with light if we shot at night. The director ultimately agreed to shoot this scene at night, and we were off to the races.
So here’s how I lit it:
Moonlight: Out of frame right I hoisted a bare Westcott 35W LED screw-in bulb as high as I could get it on a c-stand. It blows me away how much money and time we can save now on lighting with today’s technology. LED lighting and a super fast camera got us moonlight for hundreds of dollars less than it would have cost even 6 years ago.
Wall accent lights: I set up two 75w tungsten flood light bulbs on dimmers at the base of the stacked concrete wall. I knew that by placing them at the wall’s base and scraping them upwards, they would throw shadows that would bring out the wall’s texture. During setup, we did have some trouble with both a bad dimmer and a bad bulb. I had an extra bulb, but not an extra dimmer. I thought about the problem for a little bit, then realized all I needed to do was put the dimmer upstream from a tri-tap, then run stingers out from the tri-tap to the lights! Both bulbs were dimmed the exact same amount, and it turns out I didn’t need two dimmers in the first place.
Corrugated roof light: I set a soft box with a tungsten 100W bulb shooting out of the sliding glass door to scrape across the underside of the corrugated roof of the porch.
Main room light/character backlight: I set a china ball with a tungsten 100W bulb back and to the left of the talent.
Lower room light: I simply adjusted the light level of the dimmable can lights already built into the ceiling towards the back of the room.
The only other lighting was done in post. Our VFX guy added clouds and lightning, which would periodically backlight parts of the clouds.
Here’s the finished film:
October
To start off what turned out to become my busiest month of the year, I was hired by Blare Media to direct, direct photography and edit an internal video for Cavco, which is a major home builder based in the Southwest. I was very pleased with how it came out, and Blare provided an excellent crew and gear to help me create outstanding visuals.
I was also brought on as cinematographer to complete production of a short film, “Waltz of the Flower”, which is a short film from new director Praise Kyogera. It was my first time working with lead actress Kyleigh Bakker and I was very impressed with her performance.
I have participated in the 20 for 20 campaign since December 2019. The original goal of 20 for 20 was to create 20 high quality short films in 2020. I’m sure we would have accomplished our goal had it not been for the lockdowns. Nevertheless, we got up and running in the tenth month and I directed photography for director Kelly Rabadi on “Isabel”, the first short film of the 20 for 20 campaign to go into production. I was happy to hear that Kyleigh Bakker would be starring in this film as well, and of course she knocked it out of the park. It was a tough shoot, but thanks to my hard-working crew Trace Winter and Kyle Groop we delivered excellent footage in an efficient manner.
December
Director Alex D. Hurt II had been planning to shoot his short film, “Death’s Wager” for a year and a half before we finally got our first day of footage in the can. We shot in three Phoenix area locations in one day, including at Kiwanis Park in Tempe which provided some challenging logistics, as we had to hand-carry all our gear and a heavy park bench a good quarter mile into the park from the parking lot. Thanks to the excellent crew we got it done. We’ve got another day of shooting coming up at the beginning of 2021 so I’m really looking forward to it since we’ll be shooting a day exterior in a fantastical location with quite a bit of VFX to be added.
For Christmas gifts for my family, I decided to make calendars with photos I had shot throughout the year. I had done the same a couple years before and my sister and neice told me over this summer how much they loved them, and urged me to make another one. Going through my photos from the last two years, I determined I had enough photos from Jerome to make the entire calendar themed around the intriguing old mining town. I went through Costco when I had my calendars printed a couple years back, but I wanted more control this time. So I laid everything out and had them printed by Biltmore Pro Print, who do excellent work. When I went to pick them up, a couple guys in the shop described my photography as “mysterious” and as having “a very distinct style.” It’s always great to get positive, unsolicited reviews from print shop guys because they print all kinds of photography day in and day out. If they’re raving, that means my stuff stood out to them. I wasn’t originally planning on selling my calendars, but I gave a calendar as a gift to one person and he loved it so much he ordered 15 of them the next day! I now plan to sell my calendars in Jerome and online, and I’ll also be making a special calendar to sell at the 8th Annual Jerome Indie Film & Music Festival which will take place on May 6-9, 2021. Since half the year will be over at that point, the JIFMF calendar will start at the month of June 2021 and end at the month of May 2022.
Eat a dick, Gavin Newsom.
It’s been a rough year for everyone. Duh. But we can make 2021 an outstanding year if we won’t settle for anything less. If you need high quality commercial, music video, documentary, short or feature film production, please don’t hesitate to contact Psychicflyingmonkey Productions.
Have an excellent 2021, and stay free
