The Sound From Beyond

[GTP]

Greetings Everyone,

I'd like to introduce my contribution to the DVXuser Horror contest, called The Sound From Beyond. It was shot entirely around the Madison, WI area beginning at the end of August, 2006. One particular location took us just outside of Sauk City, which, for those of you familiar with the writings of H.P. Lovecraft, is the home of Arkham House Publishing, established by August Derleth. The film, as evidenced by the title, is largely inspired by the work of H.P. Lovecraft, whom I have been a huge fan of since the age of 13.

I want to mention a story about one particular location. I received a tip from a friend about a place that sounded perfect for the film. The problem was, the information was secondhand and unspecific. It was an abandoned house situated somewhere in what amounted to a twelve mile stretch of road.

My wife and I drove up and down this stretch of road, and could not find the location. At one point we saw five or six hawks circling in the sky. I glanced at them for a few seconds, and wondered what they were looking for. I had to physically turn around in my seat to see the field they circling, and as I did, I saw our abandoned house tucked away in a small valley. It was as if the hawks were telling us right where the location was.

Wisconsin is a bizarre place. I have seen some of the strangest and creepiest things since moving back here from Chicago. Some of these things are from that location outside of Sauk City, and will make it into the film. These are things you can't write, or invent. They just are.

http://www.dvxuser6.com/uploaded/7094/1159245125.jpg

Between things known, and things unknown, where the cosmic meets the mundane, are the sounds from beyond.

[VersuS]

Welcome and good luck with your entry! Nice to see more people inspired by H.P. Lovecraft!!!

ps. edit your signature as the link is not tightly integrated to your banner ;-)

[spooky138]

Welcome! I look forward to seeing your flick! Much love for Lovecraft. The man was a tortured genius!!!

[Brandon Rice]

Hey cool stuff, welcome!

[n8ture]

Welcome!
Look forward to your film. It's nice to see such a Midwest representation here!

[GTP]

Thanks... we finished shooting last week, so now we are trying to hammer it all together... A friend is finishing up some composite shots tonight, then those will be ready to work into the mix... If you get the chance, you should check out his art and fiction at: http://www.robotika.org/ He does fantastic work...

[Beat Takeshi]

Cool story about the house. Good luck with your entry.

[Jack Daniel Stanley]

Welcome ... done shooting? How about some grabs?

[GTP]

Added a screen shot to the first post...

[Matt Sconce]

Spiftabulous!

[Jaime V]

nice. Love lovecraft. I look forward to your entry, good luck in post.

[Lingothree]

Yay! Creepy Wisconsin movie! Wisconsin served as inspiration for mine, as well.

[cinealma]

Yay! Creepy Wisconsin movie! Wisconsin served as inspiration for mine, as well.

So, what's up with Wisconsin? :shocked:


John G.

[Brandon Rice]

They have good cheese... right?

[Michael_Petro]

Hey I used to live in racine worked for arrow heating and air long long time ago

Wisconsin what's up with it....lets see oh yeah

I drove from jacksonville fl. it was 80F 3 days later I was in Racine it was 2 yup 2 so to some it up it was frickin Cold :) ... Needless to say I moved back to Jax :) Although Summer was very nice but I decided I liked humidity better than snow :) oh yeah lest i forget One other cool thing about racine was on just about every corner there was a bar :) winters are long baby :)

[GTP]

So, what's up with Wisconsin?

You could check with Ed Gein, or that Dahmer guy...

[GTP]

Alright, we are officially uploaded! I'm very happy with the final cut. This has been a great experience-- getting something done at such a frantic pace. I hope you all will check it out. Thanks to everyone... I'm looking forward to seeing all of your films...

[Brandon Rice]

I will certainly be checking it out dude! Good luck!

[luster]

i like the screenshot. that surveillance video look is always scary.

[Edgen]

I'm anxious to see if this movie is a sci-fi horror combo! I've seen your poster/banner and I've been suckered into just staring at it for an uncomfortable amount of seconds. :) Of course i'm always a sucker for the audio candy as well. Good luck!

/j

[luster]

i second that, i'm assumiong the sound design on this one will be incredible

[Geoff_R]

You've got a few great locations in this piece. I like the scientist, Michael. I think he did a pretty decent job overall. I was engaged in the story but I got a little lost because as time went on, I don't think enough was being revealed to me. I think I got the message/theme of the piece but conversely, I feel like I was too misdirected in the beginning to understand or appreciate the message.

I would like to know more about the person making their way through the woods and what they're doing. At first I thought they were being chased, or looking for something/someone, but as time went on I became more and more confused as to their intentions.

Sound design was another good element in this film. I was getting freaked out at times, waiting for something terrible to get the scientist.

[Edgen]

Humm.. well, this was definitely different than what I expected. If that heavily breathing dude/being came across and showed itself last second of the film, this would have scored huge points with me. But, it didn't. I was throughly confused just waiting for something to happen. And.. nothing ever happened.

I really liked the scientists perfamance, but then again it was masked by all the scan line video footage. NOt sure how that fit in. or... what time period this guy was from.

ah... something was just missing. Great potential but like many of the films, left you hanging of...

double tee eff.

/j

[VersuS]

I dont think there are a lot of things to say about this one, technically it was not bad, you had some nice shots, nice lighting, nice locations, the scientist and the use of the TV fx worked...but there was no story whatsoever...it got boring (sorry!!!!!) after a while and I expected some shock in the end...but it left me with a 'what did just happen? did anything happen at all?'

[TimurCivan]

This was fantastic i LOVED it.. it was a work of art.

you got 3 10's..... and mostly 8and 9's.

[Kholi]

Review | POSSIBLE SPOILER ALERT! I watch the movies first time around strictly for enjoyment, second and third for review.

Sounded like sounds from beyond to me. Aside from the heavy breathing and all. It was quite -- different -- and looks like ya had fun walking around and doing it. I would like to know what exactly's going on, though. Congrats on gettin' something done.

[TheatreGuy]

GTP, I am trying to make something of what I just saw. I am NOT trying to mean and maybe I should just keep my comments to myself. But I feel that this festival and this forum are about sharing, learning and growing. And I really do want to know and understand what you were trying to accomplish.

I know that you understand elements of filmmaking because you captured some interesting elements. The travelling camera work is mysterious and kept me guessing.

The shots of the professor work so well. The video quality that you created was great. I really enjoy that camera work that you did in that office.

The story is where I am at a loss. Maybe there doesn't always have to be a story, but I feel that there should be some sense of completion.

Honestly, and I thought that this would have cool, I thought that the professor was on a planet OTHER than earth and the travelling guy was going to discover the tape. That would have blown my mind!

Very interesting "experiment." Please, please, please know that I am very curious what the message is here. I am sure that you have one. I just missed it.

Congrats on putting together a film for the festival.

Ted

[Kyle Stebbins]

Great job! High marks on a round... I loved it.

[Inexistence]

Everyday we're bombarded by electromagnetic radiation from space.
Who knows what was/is being transmitted from the far reaches of
space. The concept, from my comprehension, about the discovery of
being alone or not being alone in the universe is quite
terrorfying. What could be worse than dying alone? That's just me
talking but, the mental shock of intelligent alien lifeforms
would be bring about many fears and or excitement. Are we ready
to accept aliens with all the varied amouts of destruction we bring
upon ourselves?

The searching through the forest in 1st person was a great analogy
for sifting through mountains of erie sounds too. As far as execution
the tv shots were nice but I could see even more scenes in the vien of
searching through the forest. Maybe an underwater scene which is the
very opposite of space but, that might add an extra level of internal
struggle. Just sugesstions though.

Overall, I loved the sounds and concept but, I would also like to
see a little more composition to shots. Still, well done.

[GTP]

Greetings Everyone,

Thank you all for the comments and criticisms on the film, I really do appreciate it. One of the best things about a forum like this is that you can learn from other films, and from yourself, then move forward, hopefully making the next project that much better.

There is an interesting story behind the last few days of editing this film. Not only was the festival due date looming, but also the due date of our baby, which was on September 30. My wife and I worked all day editing the film on the due date, hoping that he would hold off until we could finish. We finished the edit around 8 PM on Saturday, the 30th. By the time my wife felt the first contraction the following day, I was actually still in the process of uploading the film.

Our baby was born on the 2nd, and since then, it has been an interesting time around here. Needless to say, I haven't had as much time to post in the threads lately, but I have managed to watch a few of the films. Some great work all around.

Thank you again for all of your comments on the film.

[luster]

Why Aren't People Commenting On This Film?????

This film definitely deserves a discussion. I thought it was very ambitious, and quite honestly one of the scariest of all the films in this fest.

I good piece of art often raises more questions than it answers, and I think that's what this piece does.

[Michael_Petro]

Why Aren't People Commenting On This Film?????

I think because its a hard film to review... Me personally kinda slow and I was getting bored with it and some people may like it but its hard to comment on some guy breathing hard running through the woods then into an abondon house while some guy comments on signals from space. To me its a hard movie to understand. I could be wrong but I think others feel the same.

[cinealma]

I really like the concept of what you were trying to do here. I really liked the video take on the scientist. And I like most of the sound design a whole bunch, especially the digital interference stuff.

But the film on the whole was kind of eventless. It felt like you had three different sequences: 1. Somebody or something walking through the woods looking at curiously shaped tree parts on their way to a semi-demolished house, 2. The zoom-in's to man-made structures and 3. A guy reciting? the words from a book. And you cut back and forth between them without much of a clue to why. I was waiting for something to come busting into the room with the scientist or something. But nothing really happened.

Maybe I just didn't get it? I'll have to rewatch this one and see.


John G.

[GTP]

Greetings Everybody,

I apologize for the delay in getting a response posted… if you take a look a few posts back, I hope you will understand why.

H.P. Lovecraft once wrote: “The oldest and strongest emotion of mankind is fear. And the oldest and strongest kind of fear is fear of the unknown.”

I began this project by thinking about what scares me. The answer for me is in something more primal and internal than a stalker or madman can deliver. I am talking about cosmic fears, a vast emptiness. Things that exist on different timescales than human—a consciousness so large, is actually crosses time and space. There are spaces that exist between these things known and unknown, between the cosmic and the mundane. How would a human react in the face of such a thing? Would it be possible to actually maintain some semblance of sanity upon such a discovery?

With that in mind, I started shooting. I knew from the beginning I was going to rely on sound and feeling more than anything. I had an idea of how I wanted things to come together, but it wasn’t set in stone or anything. I wanted the first person shots to imply searching, and a progression forward. Also, I was looking for certain types of images, a branch pointing to the sky, or part of an electrical structure forming a triangle, which again implies an upward motion. I stayed completely open to spontaneity, in fact, had I not turned down a certain road at a particular time, I would not have gotten that shot with the electrical structure, which as it turned out, is one of my favorites.

All in all I shot about 7 hours of footage. Then came the edit. To compare filmmaking to writing, the final script will always be more of a rough draft than anything. As you edit, new things emerge that you may not have noticed before, and I wanted to make sure to stay open to that (as I had throughout the process). Also, it became clear that I had too much monologue material for the scientist. I make the decision that less would be more, and would help keep the mystery intact, instead of attempting to explain too much, which often seems to be the tendency.

I realize that this type of film is not for everyone. It is only natural to want to have things explained. But for me, the whole point of making a horror film is not to give the audience what would make them comfortable, but to make sure they leave the experience feeling a bit unsettled.

[TheatreGuy]

GTP, Thank you for sharing your work with us and thank you for the personal message you sent me.

I really love your approach to filmmaking and look forward to your future work.

I have learned so much here and value what I have left to learn.

Congratulations and Best of luck to you!

Ted

[Lingothree]

Hi - this looked very interesting, but was quite isoteric I think. So I didn't get it. But don't worry about me. I'm slow.