"Spying for Fun and Profit" - Official Thread

Cool! I have a Nikon D70 and love it! Congrats. Happy shooting! (and thanks for the kudos on the banner! I have to share the credit with fellow dvxuser, Preston!)
 
Well, it's finally done. Spying for Fun and Profit has been uploaded and now I can finally get a good night's sleep. And THAT, is the biggest reward of them all!
 
Great news to hear you got it in, Karl. I can't remember this small of a fest since HEROFEST (which was even a little smaller still), but the reasons are different ... a lot of folks simply weren't able to finish in time, so huge kudos to all those who could pull it through!

Look forward to seeing your film.
 
Haha, the characters in the poster crack me up. Especially for the genre. Looking forward to it. :beer:
 
Hey Carleton, nice job! Very entertaining and amusing. The music started to grate on my after a while. Maybe just me but there was something hard to listen to about it. The pitch or something. Anyway, small detail.

I loved your concept and I think it works. I especially love the "clicks" with the credits!

Good job!

-Ted
 
Standard Disclaimer: I've yet to see a bad film so far in this fest. Congratulations to every film maker, everyone did a great job. All my comments and criticisms are meant to be constructive and helpful and in no way am I trying to take anything away from what you accomplished.

Good: Clever ideas. Makes me want to try the pizza thing out.

Not as Good: Obviously things could have been more polished, but for what you were going for superb production value wasn't necessary.

Sidenote: The lead reminded me of the guy from the goodwill commercials, especially during the beginning.
 
I see your points about me using the music a little too much. I could probably have left some parts non-scored but then, you'd all have to endure my lousy sound mixing skills! And nobody wants that! =)

I met Dmitry about a year or so ago here on DVXuser through a tread labeled : Free Score and Soundtracks ... There was also mention of a free hat... And we've worked on several projects together. Since he lives in Vancouver, Canada and I live in San Diego, USA, our only means of communication is online.

We frequently utilize AIM to discuss the project and then I'll upload a rough cut to a server and he'll compose to that. Then after lots more FTP-ing well decide on a particular track and he'll polish it and send it to me in AIFF form. It all sounds a little tedious, but it's actually quite beneficial because then all the conversations are documented perfectly and should I ever need to recall a particular idea one of us had, I can just use AIM to find the previous conversation.

In other news, I've watched 20 films so far and taken plenty of notes on each. When I'm done with all of them, I'll post in everybody's respective threads!
 
Karl,

Really nice job. Very original - and that gets super high marks from me.

I saw the earlier comments on the music. The music was good, but maybe just a touch over-used. Really liked your lead actor - just the right combination of smarminess.

Nice wardrobe. OK - it was the cap. Oddly appropriate.

Liked to graphics, too. Nice job.

Couldn't help thinking that I hope you have clearances on those photographs in the porn segment. Sorry - that's the producer side of me crawling out.

Thanks very much for making this. I really enjoyed it.
 
What are you all talking about, the music was underused! =))

And yes, the photos were all purchased by Carleton. All the ladiez are legit yo.
 
Thanks Dahopa,

The porn chicks are all royalty free photos I got from BigStockPhoto.com for a mere $2 a piece! I'll be using that site again in the future. Also of note, the intro shot of the "CIA HQ" was actually a still photo from the same place that I bought the chicks' photos. I just isolated the building element in Photoshop, laid some timelapse clouds footage (taken from my front yard) behind it, and plopped it into the movie. That building was actually a British Parliament building! =)

The credit for the wardrobe goes to the actors. I asked them to wear what they owned already. (Robin is dressed exactly like me, cept I wear a different hat). The only exception being Matilda the Maid. She and a friend had to go out and find that wardrobe at thrift stores. The whole maid ensemble cost a whopping $5! God, I love thrift stores!
 
Another great comedy! Enjoyed it whole the time, plus i now really have to try some of those things ;)
 
Thanks aFox. The script and ideas within came from fellow DVXuser John LaBonney. All ideas are actually quite feasible, with the pizza one actually stemming from a real (time tested) scam.
 
I think that this script was a great match for Carleton because he's got a real talent for utilizing production design elements. The Porn-Co and pizza logos, the photo of CIA headquarters, and the girlie pictures were great creative components. The little graphics in the first scene where Robin lists the skills he doesn't have are great, as well as the one in a such-a-huge-number-it-won't-fit-on-a-screen subtitle. Spying for Fun and Profit also gave the opportunity for a director to use some of those cool wipes and crossfades that won't work for a dramatic production.

Carleton didn't make a whole lot of changes to the script, but not all of the dialog made it into the final cut, mostly due to time elements I'm sure. One place he really saved the day was with the toilet paper scam. It was his addition to have Robin walk out with a robe, towels, toiletries, etc. He added a great joke that made what I realize was a weakly written scene into a good one.

Josh was great in this. He's good wetware.

I liked the score, thought it was pretty appropriate.

Good work Carleton!

John
 
Thanks for giving me a break from all the shoot-em up bad-guy flicks in this fest. While I enjoyed them, I really had fun watching this one. Sort of an info-mercial meets Ferris Bueller kind of thing. I could easily see Josh on the Daily Show in a few years, too. He was great. The lighting in the opening scene was brilliant, very much "I'm just shooting this with my desk lamp" feel. The camera work and lighting walked a line between the filmmaker's production value and what this wanna-be spy's production values would be.

Good work.
 
Clever film. I was thoroughly entertained. I liked that fact that you thought outside the box for this fest and I think it works. Music didn't bother me as I really didn't notice it too much (a good thing, no less).

Good job. Thanks for screening.
 
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