Wearing Many Hats

Hello little bots, sorry for the unexpected hiatus.  Last week I was out of town visiting my parents and just didn't feel like writing a blog.  But I'm back, finishing up on this mix for STIFF before Friday and looking for a part tie job. so lets jump into what's new with me.

Two weeks ago I helped out with Women in Film TST event, April's event was speed networking.  In one way I like it because you meet so many at once, but on the other hand you are stuck with someone you aren't interested in talking to or someone you want to talk to more times up and you have to move on.  At the event I meet a few people who may have possible future gig opportunities for me.  I just have to set up time and meetings with these people.  But I don't know my solid scheduled until I know for sure if I got this one job until the end of this week. 

So I've been sending out vast amount of resumes to many companies for a varied positions.  This one company who uses those damn recruiter people to "help" you with sending them your resume.  Let me stress I hate recruiters, they don't know jack shit about half of the job description and and what you have on your resume.  This recruiter I had didn't know the job description well and had such a thick Indian accent that I couldn't understand him.   I've sent him a copy of my resume 3times, each time him asking me to redo it so I can add more detail information on my past work.  Mind you with each revision I've dumb down the description of what I did in each job so much that a 2 year old would understand.  Eventually I just gave up on him and found  a direct email to the company's hiring director. 

Last week I went to the dentist for a cleaning, normal across the board.  But on Thursday my man had to go in for his wisdom teeth removal and 1 other tooth to be removed as well.  If you follow me on twitter you would have seen my conversation with him as he was getting them removed.  It freaked me out at first until I remembered he had his MS wrist band which he can text on. 

For the past 4 days I was taking care of him, except when I had to run out on Friday for a job interview which I think I fucked up on and didn't get the job.  Unfortunately I wont know for sure until the end of this week when they have made there decision. 

I also was out all day Saturday at a baby shower near my mom's house.  I didn't want to go to the shower, I find them boring, I have nothing in common with these people I went to high school with, and it serves as a reminder as one of the many reasons why I do not want children.  The only reason I went was because of my mother.  Which turned out she didn't want to go either.  We could have saved time and shipped our gifts to the new baby brat and be done with it!

After the shower I had to run all the way back to my house, check to make sure my man was still alive, and get ready for another event that night for a friends birthday party up on Capitol Hill.  This party/event I wanted to go to.  I had a blast, it was Thor themed and I wore my fuzzy viking hat and furry vest.  I got tipsy, danced all crazy, got caught up with friends that I haven't seen in forever, and just had a good time. 

Now I just have to finish up this mix with some bad audio recordings that are supper reverby.   Luckily my director knows this and is understanding as to why some sounds cant be fixed in post.  Have a good week little bots and I will see you next Monday.

See you on the other side

I'm Back,Bots!

Wheee, so I've been gone for quite some time. Almost a month if I remember correctly. Off the bat, so sorry to all my little bots that still follow me. But if you have followed me on Tumblr, Twitter, or Instagram you would have seen all my progress photos of that damn Ivy costume plus some more awesom things.

What other awesome thing you might ask? Well for starters I hacked off all my hair.

Yup, I was sick of the dead/split ends and weight of the hair when I washed it. Truth be told I told no one and I wasn’t originally going to be this short. Ah fuck it. Hair grows.

This past month I was finishing up the trailer for the documentary i'm going to be working on this May. That is all finished up, had a few tweaks but over all it turned out great. You can watch the trailer here:

For a majority of the past 2 weeks before Emerald City Comic Con I was working on that damn Ivy costume. It took for ever to sew every leaf by hand onto the body suit and hand stitch the embroidery as well. The night before I went I was stitching on the embroidery to the suite. To be honest, I'm not 100% happy with the costume. There were some more embroidery that need to be done and added, as well as add more pizazz to the bustle as well. But for a first showing it was ok. For the pictures I saw I see that I really need to lose weight. Hot damn, those thunder thighs. But it was good to see my self in that light and to motivate myself to losing weight again.

So I premiered Poison Ivy on Saturday, here are some of the pictures and you can view the full album of un-edited pictures on my flicker site here: Poison Ivy

The amazing Mikozilla in her fem Varric

My man bought a back up costume for me just incase I couldn’t get together. It was a Harley Quinn from Arkham City. I had a lot of fun with this costume, might make a better one for Pax Prime if I have time. Here are some pics of her and a link to the flicker album: Harley Quinn

With Jerikandra Cosplay and CIR carving

The low points of the con were:

• saying goodbye to my friend Katie who is moving down to California for school
• almost being hit by a car while crossing in the cross walk with it was green.
• Having the most shittiest waitress in all the land at the Hard Rock Cafe, it was so bad we didn’t even leave her a tip. We never do that but when you ignore us for the entire time we are there and give my boyfriend an attitude when as for the check, you don’t deserve one bitch.

Last week was con recovery, and getting my man ready to go over to London on a business trip for a whole week. I'm sad he is gone this week but I'm more upset at myself for not going over there. * sigh* I guess this means I just have to save up money for the next couple of years so I can go over and have a kick ass time in England... maybe try to attend London Comic Con while I'm there as well...

This week I'm hanging with the cats, trying to find a part time job, and try not to go crazy while my man is away in London.

See you on the other side

Sadness Upon The City

If you watched the Superbowl last night you know that Seattle lost due to poor coaching decisions. It was stupid to throw the ball instead of handing it off to Lynch who was outstanding last night. I'm still a fan of my Seahawks just a very sad fan for the next few days.

Besides watching a very suspenseful Superbowl, last week I was busy finishing up the two documentary clean up work and finished my 30 day work out challenges. I'm pretty proud of myself for sticking with the challenge. Now I just need to keep up with working out and lose some more weight.

Other than that I did receive a message back from the director almost immediately after sending him the ultimatum email. I sent him back an email trying to get the ball moving again to start filling out the contact, set a date of completion, and how to give him the files. But to my amazement he doesn’t reply for another week. He want my Paypal info so he can send me money but I'm getting weird feelings. So I shall send him another email for him to hold on to the money until we have a contract in place. I'm having my doubts on this guy.

Have a good week little bots, I now have an instagram account it's SchadGirl just like my twitter. See you friday for some ranting or update on weird director guy.

See you on the other side

Film Stuff And De-Fluff

Happy MLk day little bots.  I'm typing to you all from the ferry so this will probably be a short post. Are you all still buzzed over the Seahawks win last nigh, I sure am and still in a haze that we won.  Love my team.

This past week I had another women in film event that I had to go to since I am now the greeter/money take for all events.  The event was a presentation for "the art of the pitch" which should have brought in more people but with the heads of the bord for our region are so against social media, we got a smaller turn out than what we would like.  This coming Saturday is a member meeting to discuss how we can improve this organization.  WIF defiantly needs a new view point and heads of the board to make it successful.

The other part of my week I was busy cleaning up audio for the documentary film that I will be working on in March.  These pieces are for our client Shorline water front restoration who wanted clean audio from there beach walks this past summer.  If you know audio I can head you groaning about all the uncontrollable noise in the background.  It's pretty bad but I got most of the noise down and just need to go over it to duck or cut out some pop up baby cries.  

In other film new I recived a blind email asking me to do some Foley work. I've been emailing this guy back and forth all week trying to figure out what he wants out of this 2 minute foley scene which he cut it down to 1:40 in hopes to cut cost.  But what he seems to jot comprehend is the Part he cut didn't have that much Foley so it really doesn't change my original quote.  I'm having my doubts about this project since I don't have a company email and he stated that this was a labor of love for over 2 years. I get trying to get work for free when you re starting out but maybe next time plan out a budget and time frame before you start your film.

Besides film, I've been really good at sticking with my 30 day challenges.  I'm already feeling super strong in my arms, I can feel the muscles and see a little bit of them.  My abs are getting stronge which is helping my back so much.  The thighs feel stronger but can't see much of a diffrence.  I know I need to really up my cardio to see one of the results.  So far I'm proud of myself and can't wait to show you little bots my progress.

Well this is longer than what I thought it would be.  This week I will be at my moms to get some much needed supplies for my Poison Ivy Cosplay.  See you bots in a week!

See you on the other side

I'm Finished!

It's done, it's over, completion....checked! I have finally finished Dragon Age Inquisition! It only took me 90 hours to complete every damn little side quest (fuck you slow ass cow) and the ending with out spoiling left me wanting to play the DLC coming out for the game or the next Dragon Age game to complete this arc that finally is interlocking the games.

So happy to be done, and I can play the game again without doing every side quest worrying about the outcome.

The rest of the week consisted of getting back to my workout routine, cleaning, and watching bad movies with my man. The 2 most notable were Tusk and Mr. Babadook. Tusk is a Kevin Smith film and is a comic version on human centipede... it was bad and I am surprised he was able to get the actors to do this film. Mr. Babadook is a british horror film that has been getting rave reviews but as some one is is scared easily by horror films this is not frightening at all and you find yourself hating every character in this film. How it got high reviews is beyond me.

This week I plan on warping presents and hoping I slim down before the holidays. I hate this chin action i've developed... gah so fat. See you bots Friday for some x-mas gift ideas 2014 style.

See you on the other side

Moving So No Updates For A Few Weeks

 

If you follow me on Twitter last night I posted that I am moving into a new apartment. This was completely fast, my man and I have been talking about moving into a bigger for the past year and 2 spots opened up in our building. We were notified by our leasing agent on Monday that 2 apartments are available; one now and the other in November. After looking at the apartments we decided to act fast and snag the bigger of the 2 apartments especially since apartments in our build go quick. How quick you might ask, well we we looking at one the day before and the next day it was gone.

So as a result on this rash decision, I have less than 2 weeks to pack up and vacate our loft and move everything into a 2 bed and 2 bath home. I don’t know what I will do with so much space now!

Sadly for you little bots I will not be posting anything up on this blog until after the move. But I will still be tweeting and Tumblr-ing so follow up on updates of my packing and the dreaded unpacking... so boring I know.

In other news this past weekend I helped a friend out on his 48 hour horror film, luckily I only had to show up the last 7 hours to do my thing. When I can show you bots the film I will. The 48 hour committee has a weird thing about about showing the films before the awards are announced.

So thank you little bots for understanding my short hiatus, I promise I will be back in 2 weeks. Keep your eyes posted on Twitter for any updates. To not leave you guys in the dark hole void enjoy this skit from Key&Peele about texting... I to over react/miss read texts a lot.

See you on the other side

Cosplay Thoughts And Re-Edits

Hi there little bots, hope you all are having a good Monday.  Good news, this past week I did put out a Friday blog, the bad I might not do one this week...oops.  As far as my past week has been, it was busy and much has been accomplished.

  Monday I received my revision edits from Team Awesome, spent a good portion of the week tweaking air sound sound and now my eyes twitch every time i hear white noise.  The good news is I got to work on mixing, I know it is not perfect but once the dialog is completed and in the hands of the mixer all my sound effects will blend harmoniously.    Fingers crossed that they like me enough to keep me on for future projects.

  Aside from fixing audio, I have been planing out my cosplay for RTX.  I believe I mentioned that I was going to do drunken Burnie from Rooster Teeth as catbug.  I've found the perfect dress but it is ivory so i will be experimenting on dyeing fabric and praying it turns out ok.  All I need to do is dye a dress, cut a wig, paint ears, bead the top of the dress, make wings that I can transport from Seattle to Austin in a carry on bag, and finally make a harness rig for the wings.  Found a design that will work so it doesn't look like I'm wearing a back pack with a dress.  I found a beautiful design that I am going to mimic from a etsy designer.  The store is called Atelier Sylphe Corsetry
 and this is the design:

 

I think it will look marvelous.

  This past weekend my man and I went out to breakfast and dinner at Local 360.  As always the food there is good.  We also ran errands and become slobs.  As usual, our Sunday night routine is to watch Game of Thrones, and of course nothing really happens until the last 15 minutes of the show.  But I am so glad they are showing more of the White Walkers, I cant wait for winter to finally come!

This week I have a eye doctor appointment and I plan on spending some time with my mom this week.  Also a head up to anyone living in or around Seattle, go see my short film playing at STIFF next Tuesday.  Buy tickets here: Short Doc Block.

See you on the other side

Bitchn' Friday: More Shameless Self Promotion

      Happy Friday my little Bots, see I did manage to post something up today. So what if it is me shamelessly promoting a film that I worked on. Haha ha, hum....

Well lets get down to it.

    A few months ago I mentioned that I was working on a documentary short, well now it's starting to make it's way around the festival circuit. It's kicking off tonight, then it will have a run at the Seattle true independent film festival (or STIFF for short) starting on May 6^th. Fingers crossed for more festivals to come. For more information about the film, it's call Unified Struggle FYI, you can check out a sweet article here: “Unified Struggle” film tackles deportation, justice, and activism

Ticket information for the STIFF event here: STIFF

and here is the trailer for the film:

    If you cant make it out to view it that's ok, you can always view other films that i've done if you have Netflix or Hulu account. The films are The Ordinary Skier and Carbon Nation, both are documentaries and a run time of about 90 minutes each.

   Ok I'm done promoting myself, but I will be at the STIFF showing on May 6^th. Come say hi and support local film makers. See you Monday for a wrap up of my week.

See you on the other side

Happy St. Patrick’s Day

            Top of the morning to you bots.  As many of you know today is St. Patrick’s Day or other wise know as an excuse to consume alcohol excessively day!  Since I’m watching my weight for ECCC I will not be partaking in the drinking of this day.  Sad I know, but it is for the best for my waist line.

            This past week I worked on my costumes, check out last Friday’s blog for updates/progress.  I also had some computer issues in which my poor 10 year old laptop decided to get sick and have a massive about of pop up on every website and lag like a granny.  Turned out it had a huge amount of malware and a virus.  So I did what any good broke artist would do for there computer, threw it out and bout a new one. 

            I’m kidding, remember the broke part.  I installed updated anti-virus software and anti-malware and ran both those programs for 5+ hours on my computer.  Luckily it was my fart around computer and not my work computer.  I know I should probably retire this old beast but I love her so much.

            Other than the computer issues, I sent out quite a few resumes this past week.  Only heard back from 3 and I think I may only get one of those jobs if I’m lucky.  The two that I properly will not get is the one in New York (most likely going to go with someone local) and the marketing associate job for SIFF.  The one I’m hoping that will pan out is a comedy-drama independent film, I saw their trailer for the film and I think it is wonderful.  Fingers crossed for that one.

            Over the weekend, my man and I went to see 300: Rise of an Empire in IMAX 3D.  The movie was just meh, you are only there for the visuals and muscular man pecks. On Sunday, I went over to my friend’s house for a crash course on how to use a broken sewing machine and to work on out cosplay crafts.  Back at home, my man and I watched Cosmos before bed. 

            However I found it very difficult to sleep last night due to my man showing me the scariest 3 minute short film in my life.  I found it creepier than the cat with hands film.  It’s called Light’s Out and was part of the Who’s There film challenge and won best director (David Sandberg).  I was so scared I had to switch place on the bed last night so my man would be next to the dark stair case and I had the wall.  I need a barrier between me and the dark places in my apartment ok!  But the film was great and you should check it out for yourselves, 

and if the director ever sees this blog please contact me I am a sound designer (click here for website: CMBSOUND).

           

            This week I’m trying to finish as much of my cosplay as I can and again sending out more resumes. Fingers crossed for me.

            See you on the other side

Working Girl

            Hi little bots, hope you had a good week.  I for one was able to get a few things done and GASP, even socialize!   While I was able to get a majority of my to do be for I leave Seattle done, there are still a few bumps that I have to smooth over.

            This past week I went over to my mom’s to get a few thing for the trip and help bleaching my roots.  I returned back on Friday not feeling like writing a post for Friday’s blog.  Again sorry.  But I did have my meeting with the director to view the film and to receive the hard rive of the film. 

            We meet at a coffee shop near my place.  The film didn’t have that many glaring audio issues, but the “found” footage audio is bad.  The good news is the director knows this and doesn’t have high hope, just wants is audible enough for the audience to understand.  Good meeting all around.

            When I got home to open up the OMF file I was surprised that the editor did not include the video with it.  I searched the drive and could only find clips of the film.  So now I have to wait for the editor to send me a QuickTime file of the film.  When I told them I would need an OMF of the file, it usually includes the video file in it.  Sigh, new editors.

           

            So that freed up my weekend and part of Monday.  Saturday, my man and I went to the SyFy short film festival with our friend.  There were some shorts that were good but a majority of them were overly pretentious and very few science fiction themes.  We all felt hipsters have taken over the festival and thus the lack of good films.  Don’t know if we will go back next year.

            Sunday my man and I invited over our friend M and Kiri.  Kiri has a YouTube channel Whit & Whimsy, is a vlogger on Geek and Sundry called Kiriosity, and plays games on her Twitch channel call Kiriosity.  So they came over and we all played Diablo 3 on her twitch channel, I should have told you guys but I forgot.  I will post links of your game play when she posts them on YouTube.  I think it went well, forgot to plug my blog but whatever.  Let me know what you think when the video is up.

            This week I will be busy with documentary, when I get the video.  There is only so much a sound editor can do before we need the video to make sure everything is synced!  I will post something Friday, hopefully the twitch videos on kiri’s YouTube channel. 

             

            See you on the other side

Let The Parties Commence!

            Holy cow, what the fuck Seattle?  If you haven’t stepped outside this week you have been lucky.  All across the northern half of the U.S has been in a cold snap, Seattle is part of this.  It was so cold all week long that I thought my tits were going to fall off. 

            The cold does weird things to people as well.  When I tried to walk into Nordstrom to buy my mom her gift, a man was hitting on me.  He complemented me on my hair, I said thanks, and then he proceeded to take up a conversation with me.  If you are going to complement me then ok, but please move on.  I will only strike up a conversation with you at a more sociable place, not in front of a store in freezing temperature. 

            Well at least my Christmas shopping is done and I will not have to do any last minute buying.  I can now focus on all the entire social event that I have somehow wound up in.  Usually I will only have one socially event per month, two if I am lucky.  I guess it is the season to be social I suppose.

            The first social event that I partake in was the film happy hour.  Usually it happens at the end of the month, but with Novembers being canceled (thanksgiving) and with Christmas and new years at the end of the month it is better to do it at the beginning of the month.  I meet some cool people there, exchanged some cards, light banter. 

            The best connection I meet was meeting the editor on the bono film that I did.  It was nice to get some more insight on what happened before the film was in my hands and to learn that my suspicion about the director. 

            SHE IS A GIANT PUSHOVER!

           

            She pushed back the final version of the film due to the director of photography wanting to add more shoots to the film.  Wow.  The icing on the cake is that he felt the same way about the film and the director as I do.  I do hope that we will work together in the near future with a proper director.

           

            The rest of my social engagements were awesome as well.  Friday I meet up with my cosplay friend and now I have some ideas for cosplay.  So exited for the con-season to start back up in Seattle.  Saturday my man and I went to Slims Last Chance Chili, if you have never been there GO!  At Slim’s we meet up with some of his coworkers, we had some amazing chili and hung out. 

            Over all a good week aside for creeper man hitting on me.

           

            This week no party Wednesday but I do plan on having one the following week.  Still coming up with ideas, if you have a suggestion let me know.  Friday I will rant or do something.

            See you on the other side

Bitchin' Friday: The Importance of Editing

  This past Monday my friend and I went to see another friend of mine's film playing at STIFF, not to be confused with SIFF.    This was the first full length film that my friend made, it is a story about a depressed man who takes advice from a mold growing in his bathroom.  The premiss is good, though the depressed man looking for a new path has been over done, and the overall production quality was well done but something seemed off.

  My friend who came with me, we had a long discussion as to why we did not like the film.  While we both agreed about the positives of the film but what we couldn't get past was the editing or lack there of.  The film's director was also the writer and film editor, do you see where this is going.  In my personal belief you can write and direct a film and even do a little bit of editing, but what doesn't work is when you do it all.  When you do it all the story and flow of the movie may make sense to you but will seem jumbled and long to the audience. 

  I looked on the IMDB page for this film and not one person is listed as a secondary editor or writer.  There is a reason why you see five or ten different writers and editors for a major motion picture.  Now I am in no way saying that having multiple people in one role makes a good film, what I am saying is that it is a good idea to have an outside view critic  the film's story and over all flow before the final print.  Even I as a sound editor will ask another editor to come listen to my work to see if I need to add or subtract some sounds.

  This is essential to film editing, cut out all the unnecessary scenes.  If it doesn't help progress the story or character build it does not need to be in there.  The last thing you need is for your audience to be bored or walking out of the theater.   Cut the fat! 

See you on the other side.