Day Museum Film Festival - Church of Video
Huh.. That went surprisingly well! Sam Hall and I have been working on a shadow puppet music video for the past year. We’re both not necessarily gifted crafters but we put our heads down and cut cardboard, glued popsicle sticks and tried to string together all the bits. Honestly we probably made it way harder than it needed to be, but we are the type to learn by doing! It’s a strange little creation, filmed entirely with a VHS Camcorder everything is hand made and physical EXCEPT one very fun sequence towards the end of the video where Sam flexed their lo-fi 3D animating skills. After some months of slaving away we surprisingly completed it and even liked it. we wanted to celebrate, and what better way to do that then with a Film festival showcasing all kinds of weird experimental music videos. Church of Video was born!
What started out as a simple showcase of a few projects turned into a full event. We rented out a Leaven Church in North Portland, purchased everyone robes, brought mixed drinks and popcorn, created a TV Mannequin (also dressed in robes), got our good friend Jaime Lastimosa on board and pulled together one solid hour of music based video content. Following the showing we had people stick around to film a fun and trippy / comedy video about our video cult. Look for that video sometime 2024. This was such a fun event to set up and I’m so grateful to everyone for showing up and getting into the spirit of the day. Really makes me want to do another like it, especially since music video festivals like this one are quite rare. Thank you again to everyone who came out and supported us!
MARBLE OBLIVION
I’m writing this about a month after releasing the new Marble music video “Oblivion”. I always meant to type up a few thoughts on this one but life has been hectic recently (look for more Day Museum releases very soon). Once again I was given the honor of working with the Portland-Seattle band “Marble” to make another dark and moody music video.
Marble brought the song to me with a release timeline just over two weeks out. I quickly got to work on my pitch and after listening to the song several times I came up with the way too ambitious idea of shooting a music video capturing the 4th dimension. The original concept had the main character moving through a victorian mansion where we see her entire timeline play out in future and past echos of herself directly ahead and behind her. My problem was that I had no idea how to accomplish this effect. I grabbed my partner from their very busy life and had them run around doing things like writhing on the couch, dancing through the room and spinning in circles in our tiny studio apartment. I spent a few days editing together an example to show Marble for approval and after a little explanation got the go-ahead. We found the perfect victorian mansion and I worked with Marble to get a final screenplay put together. All of this happened over the course of a few days and we were prepared to film by the end of the week.
As usually happens, we were hit with a few unexpected difficulties. The victorian mansion canceled our reservation a few days before filming so I desperately looked for an alternative location. Another victorian mansion in our budget couldn’t be found so I quickly re-wrote the screenplay for a completely different location which turned out to be a bigger job than I thought. So much of the original screenplay had this large location in mind, with Chantel walking into and past several rooms where we would have little scenes play out in the background. Because the location we ended up getting was considerably smaller I changed everything to accommodate the size and style of the space. The 4th dimensional part of the video became a much smaller piece of the Final Cut, The main characters actions slowed down and we built a kind of horror/mystery out of the future and past versions of herself.
The final concept is about a person that has committed suicide after struggling through a dark, lonely and hopeless time in their life. The main character is dead, slumped over in a chair and has a final moment where she follows herself through her final day. There is continuously a visual of a duplicate either directly in front of or behind the protagonist either showing what will happen next or showing what had just happened. This continues until the moment where the character realizes that they are dead and absorbs back into their body.
There was a discussion of how clear we should make it that the main character is dead and I’m glad we decided not to, we wanted to leave a lot of this video up to interpretation of the viewer. I’ve heard many different interpretations of the video and many different interpretations of the song and I think they work together really well. What is your oblivion?
Since all of this was so last minute that actual filming also got a little hectic. After 3 hours of our 10 hour shoot we only had the first two shots completed. We set off the fire alarm once due to excessive fog machine use. We had to shoot out in the pouring rain underprepared with a hastily put together cover. Finally a whole room I expected to have on location wasn’t there due to a listing error.
I personally love the final version of this video and I’m really proud of it. All of the complications that come with a film project really brings out the creativity of the group. I think the original idea would have been cool but there’s something about working with limitations and last minute changes that really adds character and interest to the final video to me. I never hope that everything falls apart at the last minute but I’m always so happy to see what comes of it.
Watch Oblivion here and follow Day Museum for more overly ambitious projects!
2023
This was an excellent year for Day Museum. I returned to filmmaking after taking a hiatus from the industry in 2022, and 2023 was the first “Full” year back. I worked as a gaffer on Mike Ghoul’s noire thriller “Out on Death” and Mike Ghoul’s “Livewire” a DP on Jaime Lastimosa’s “A Sweet Curse” and Joe Cullan’s “Pink Lemonade” and directed a handful of videos that I’m real proud of.
The marble “marble” music video released this year and received Best Music Video from The Oregon Short Film Festival and The Under 5 Minute Feedback Festival. It streamed Online through Wildsound and I also ended up as a guest on the Wildsound podcast to discuss the music video.
“Sacrifice” Released this year for Halloween and it received a wonderful reception. We were able to premier it at a halloween party on October 31st and I’m incredibly proud of what we were able to accomplish in two short weeks from original conception to release.
Behind the scenes this year I finished a brand new script that I plan on filming early 2024 currently Titled “Sleepers Coffin.” We also completed the majority of work on a Shadow Puppet Music video in collaboration with Sam Hall. The footage is looking fantastic and I can’t wait to share more. Work has also begun with a few Portland musicians to get brand new Music videos made for their bands.
2024 is already off to a good start with three active projects and two more on the way. I am so excited to be back behind the camera this year and I have many hopes and dreams for Day Museum. The momentum is building and expect to see more posts, videos and blog updates. This appears to be one of the busiest years of my life but my excitement and energy levels have also never been higher! Feeling very motivated and inspired by several different bands, filmmakers and people in my life.
Favorite films I watched this year:
Banshees of Inisherin
Astroid City
Barbie
Barbarian
The boy and the Heron
Favorite Short Film
White Eye
Favorite albums this year
Greet Death - Dixieland
Home is Where - The Whaler
Home is Where - We Became Birds
Soft Cheese - Soft Cheese
The Black Heart Procession - 2
McBaise - Tubes
Phoxjaw - Royal Swan
Lincoln - Everything is wrong
The Sounds of Animals Fighting - Apeshit
The Walking Who - Lewiside
The World is a Beautiful Place and I’m no Longer Afraid to Die - Harmlessness
The World is a Beautiful Place and I’m no Longer Afraid to Die - Illusory Walls
Favorite Books this year
Jeff Vandermeer - Annihilation
My Favorite Music Videos 08/2023
Music Videos? I love them! Here is a list of some of my all time favorites as of August 2023.
Manchester Orchestra - Simple Math
Royal Blood - Out of the Black
King Gizzard and The Lizard Wizard - Black Hot Soup (DJ Shadow “My Own Reality” Re-Write
Danger Mouse, Daniele Lippi - Two against one FT. Jack White
WHY? A Sky for shoeing horses under
Anima - Thom Yorke (Netflix)
Behind the Scenes - Marble music video
I am thrilled to direct another music video for Marble. Their self titled song is one of my favorite songs off of their debut album and it was real honor to be trusted with the visuals.
The song feels like it has such a clear identity, there was little doubt in my mind of how I wanted to adapt it. I wrote a script following a young woman on the day that she planned to leave her abusive husband. There needed to be obvious tension between the two, thick shadows and claustrophobic camera angles. I really visualized a noir film where everything that’s happening on screen is eery without being overly obvious. Chantel plays the lead character, fearing her husbands quick temper while also grieving the end of an era, slowly marching through the regular routine of the day while waiting for a cab to arrive and take her away for good. This simple premise also allowed us to make it a little retro on a small budget, using props from the 50’s to give it a different kind of overall feeling. A lot of my focus was on keeping the visuals interesting enough to stand on their own and hopefully good enough to compliment such a superb song.
Fortunately Marble once again gave me the green light to make it how I wanted to make it. They have always given so much creative freedom to the artists they collaborate with and I am so grateful for that amount of trust.
The actual filming of the music video went surprisingly smooth. The bulk of it happened over just two days and even though more time is always wanted when filming, it turned out to be just enough to get everything we planned for. The dark room scenes were all filmed at snap studio PDX. The space was just big enough to light without fear of accidentally lighting a wall or column. It still turned out to be a puzzle since there is a fine line between too dark and too light with an “infinite black” look. The first shot took us two of our precious ten hours to get right but once we figured out the space, everything picked up from there. Fortunately we had Mike Ghoul running camera’s around getting shots set up, Jaime Lastimosa tinkering with light bulbs, Carl Suby holding flashlights, poles, ladders and running blackout curtains like a champ, Vijay Ilankamban grabbing us pizza and heating up soup, Taylor Bailey telling me which shot I shot out of order is the shot I should have shot before shooting the wrong shot. It got hectic but I’m really happy with how it all looks from that day.
The second day I was locked in my apartment with blackout curtains taped to my ceiling pouring soup, throwing mugs and splashing water. Most of this footage is all the super close footage you see in the final film.
The third day was spent at the wonderful Joel and Mimi Hoyer’s house. They were kind enough to let us film the external scenes using their beautiful old home. The architecture of the place had the perfect sharp and pleasing lines I was hoping for. Charles Wicklander met us there to share his stunning car with us, he was also kind enough to be the driver. He drove up and down that driveway 20-30 times on a brutally hot day. Thanks to him we were able to use a real 50’s car as the final prop in the film. The only real difficult part of filming this day was dealing with my recently injured and very swollen foot. I hobbled along on the only day I needed to chase Chantel down the stairs with a camera and fortunately the extra bumps actually work to the films advantage.
A couple of fun little easter eggs about filming this short video. I forgot to try and make the soup taste good when preparing for the day.. so Chantel and Matthew ate full helpings of really shitty vegetable water, there were a lot of takes. We forgot the luggage on the final day of filming so Chantel is running to the car holding a baby’s booster seat that is colored the same as her luggage from the previous scenes. The kitchen we were going to use had a microwave that we couldn’t move so instead we filled an empty room with a few cooking tools to make it work. Carl Suby had to lay on his back on the concrete floor just out of frame holding a light more then once to get it looking bright enough. The backwards clock is actually backwards and it is genuinely from the 50’s.
Thanks for following my latest projects. Many more to come!
Collaboration In the first half of 2023
Day Museums Collaborating
The first half of 2023 has been a wonderful period of collaboration. I have been meeting and getting to know a few other local film makers that have invited me on to their sets. This has allowed me to focus my efforts into more specialized parts of film making like gaff, DP and Cameraman. I love directing but being able to step back and put all of my energy into a single aspect of filmmaking is extremely fun and rewarding.
Early this year I was given the opportunity to be the Director of Photography on a short film directed by Jaime Lastimosa titled “A Sweet Curse”. The film used candle light as the main motivation for the scenes which was a new puzzle for me. Every camera position created a fresh challenge of how to appropriately and creatively light the actors, without capturing the many lights and diffusers hidden mere inches out of frame. Lighting the scene well enough to avoid excessive noise and controlling the spill was something that was difficult to balance but the end result looks wonderful. Jaime really wanted and planned for a lot of steady motion with the camera so nearly every scene uses Jib arms or rails. Moving the camera from Jib to Rail to Tripod to Rail while also hiding all of the “candle light enhancers” was very slow but once again the end result made it all completely worth it. I recently got to see the film nearly complete and I’m incredibly proud of how it looks.
About a month after working on a sweet curse, Mike ghoul approached me to gaff on his Noir short film “Out on Death”. I love noir style film and especially love the lighting techniques used on them. Noir to me is full freedom in to use lighting in story telling to its fullest potential. Villains get harsh shadows, the femme-fatale gets a soft glow, shadows paint the wall and spotlights can be motivated or not. Anything goes! We used light and shadow carefully painted into every single scene and I’m shocked at how good and true to the genre it looks. Keep an eye out for this release, it’s an entertaining film that Mike really put his whole heart and soul into.
Fortunately I love working with Mike, Jaime and the rest of the holy shoot crew because soon after “Out on Death” we were back at it with Movie Madness’s first ever 48 hour film festival. This 48 hour festival went wonderfully. Mike wrote a funny, sad and sweet script that won best story and even though we only had 48 hours the stress stayed light thanks to a killer team with good vibes. “Live wire” was very well received by the audience and I’m glad got to see it premier in Movie Madness’s badass “Mini Plex”. This was Mike’s last film before moving back down to LA and I think it’s one of his best.
Otherwise this year I also have wrapped on a new music video for Marble that I’m incredibly proud of and excited to share more about, keep an eye on my blog and instagram to see exactly when it drops.
Working with Holy Sheet
Holy Sheet is a micro budget Indie film team in Portland Oregon and they are known for making extremely creative short films mostly based in the horror/comedy genres. I had seen a few of their short films when digging around the internet looking for other Portland creatives and I really liked what I saw. The writing is snappy, the direction is engaging and you can tell there is a lot of intention in each element of their films creation. As a new portlander I have been looking to build my local film network and I was very excited to get an opportunity to work with Holy Sheet on the sequel to award winning “Pumpkins Attack”.
I happened to check Facebook right when Holy Sheet put out a call for extra help. They had signed up for Guignolfest 2022 and were preparing for the shoot that weekend. I reached out and got placed as the Gaffer for the shoot date. It’s always a gamble when signing up to help on a set with people you have never even met before, especially in a high stress situation like a film race. I had no need to be worried though as the Director Mike Ghoul, Cinematographer Jaime, Audio Specialist Joel and Writer Joe all turned out to be very smart/fun/easy people to work with. Guignolfest is a 72 hour film festival where teams are expected to write, film and edit a whole horror short in 3 days. The teams are given a prop, a line and a theme that needs to show up in the film, and the final runtime can’t exceed 6:66 minutes. Holy Sheet were given environmentalism as their theme and they slapped together one hell of a script.
Because we only had two short days to film, the days were fast and hectic. I mainly worked with Jaime and Hayes quickly setting up and moving the lights as the shoot moved from the kitchen to the stairs to the backyard to the kitchen to the basement, to the stairs, to the basement to the kitchen to the road. The lighting was supposed to be very expressionistic and eye catching, not necessarily realistic so it left plenty of room for creativity. We had a lot of light to work with thanks to Holy sheet’s lights, my lights and the PA Hayes Tufts lights. We threw color up over every scene and used a lot of soft and hard light to create some pretty cool effects. I had a great time improvising as we quickly ran from room to room getting as much done as possible. I would have loved more time to really set up and monitor how the lights looked but I’m overall happy with how it went even if it was rushed. Both shoots ran really late into the night but I’ve gotten used to that being the case 99% of the time when filming.
In the end all of our hard work payed off. only one week later the cast and crew sat in a sold out theatre watching all of Guignolfests wonderful short films. The energy was high throughout the night and the crowd cheered with every blood splatter, yelled warnings to the characters on the screen, gasped at the double crosses and laughed at the absurdity of situations. I was very impressed by the quality of most short films shown that night. Making any film in 72 hours is a difficult task and my expectations were shattered again and again. Finally “Pumpkins Attack 2 - Still attacking” popped up on screen and I got to see what those tired/caffeine fueled days produced. The lines were funny, the acting over the top in all the right ways, the kills were cheesy and wonderfully gooey, and the lights actually looked pretty good! When awards started being handed out I thought we might win best script, best director, best effects, best makeup maybe one of the best films but I was surprised to find that we won best lighting and 2nd runner up overall!
Every person who worked on “Pumpkins Attack!” donated their time and talent to make the film the best it could be. It was a very difficult project, and a very exhausting process but I was impressed by the hard work and commitment from everyone involved. Overall this turned out to be a very inspiring project that introduced me to many wonderful people, I would definitely do another Guignolfest and I look forward to working with many of these people again in the future.
making the Arpenter Music video
It’s been two weeks since releasing the Arpenter- Better Parts Music Video and I’ve been very happy with the reception. This whole project was challenging (as most are) but it was also some of the most fun and gratifying work that I have ever put together. I learned a lot through the process of releasing this video and I now have some new knowledge that will feed into future releases.
I spent most of my preparation time focusing on the lyrics, the tone and the overall vibe of “Better Parts”. The song feels upbeat and hopeful, but the lyrics read heavy and somewhat somber. Presley (Arpenter) sent me links to several music videos with elements that he liked, there were specific performances, camera techniques, and group scenes that we pulled from for influence. We went back and forth for a couple of weeks trying to nail down the concept and ultimately landed on the party idea. Over the years I have watched quite a few music videos focused around parties, and I really wanted to make something that felt natural but stood out from the crowd. The concept changed many times but we eventually decided to try and keep it mellow for the opening minute, mixing in handstands, bloody knuckles, arm wrestling and tarot as the night continued on. I put more planning time into this video than any other video before it, but it still was nerve wracking coming up to the actual shoot. I kept thinking that I had forgotten something major or that in the end the concept just wouldn’t vibe. I have historically only filmed videos with a clear narrative, this video was planned to be experimental, and I don’t have as much experience making that type of film. I still went into the day confident and determined to get the best footage possible.
In the morning I reviewed all of my scouting video and made sure that I had a clear plan of attack. We only had one day to get all of our footage and the shoot started at 5pm. Presley texted me early that we couldn’t get the fog machine that we had planned to get, so he was quickly reaching out to several different people trying to find another one. I tried not to worry about it and went through all of my equipment, I made sure that I had absolutely everything and then headed over to the house we planned to film at. When I arrived I found Presley who miraculously was able to scrounge up a pro fog machine and we went to work setting the house up for the shoot with Chantel, Joe and Becca. A few hours before our start time the cancellations started rolling in, we had about twenty people invited and nearly all of them bailed last minute. We quickly reached out to people hoping that we could get enough to make it feel like a real party. I was trying to work out alternative ideas just in case we couldn’t get anyone but fortunately it wasn’t needed. There were a number of people that showed up last minute and ready to pitch in, we quickly made sure everyone was caught up and wearing the right style, and we started shooting around 6:30pm. It was a late start and Presley and I scrambled to get all the shots we needed. Fortunately the party went beautifully, we really just tried to create a genuinely fun party that everyone could naturally enjoy and randomly would pull people when we needed them to do something. Pretty much all of the party shots were unscripted and caught candidly, I think that really helps make the video feel natural and not too forced. The vibe throughout the whole night was extremely positive and Presley melted into his role perfectly. We didn’t finish everything up until a bit after midnight but we left feeling good and like we had accomplished everything planned.
I knew the footage I got was exactly what we wanted while editing, typically the further off I am from my plan the more time I spend in post but this video fell together beautifully with minimal adjustments needed. my first draft is remarkably similar to the final draft even after several versions and several sweeps front to back. Thank you to everyone who helped make it all possible, I really enjoyed working with Presley, he is extremely cool and an excellent artist/performer. Joe and Becca were incredibly kind to lend the us their house and for giving us their time on screen. My sister Chantel did such a great job directing the clothing, my wife Taylor was the perfect person to bounce ideas off of and my friend Carl helped me a lot by reading through the shot list and by contributing some artistic ideas. Thank you to the party goers, Bria Rice-Gomez, Jonathan Nadal, Julia Nett, Maya Elasady, Chantel Bailey, Kevin LaRocca, Ellie Kim, Joe Conner, Kelly Perez, Ashley Villarreal, Taylor Bailey and Matthew Blount. Also Thank you to everyone following Day Museum, I have a very small group of people keeping up with my releases but it really means a lot to me to see your comments and to hear what you all thought. I’ll keep the releases rolling!
On tour with marble
Filming a tour video takes many hours of driving, drinking, talking, laughing, grooving and improvising. Having just filmed a weeks worth of tour footage I am feeling hyped up. Not only did I get to spend a significant amount of time with an incredibly fun group of people but I also got a chance to flex my creative muscle and get a wide variety of shots to build into something later.
This is a fun type of filmmaking that I haven't gotten a lot of time with, trying to capture the energy of a concert through a lens is a fantastic challenge. I think most music is best experienced live, the motion of the crowd, the flow of drinks, the energy breathing off the performers and the permanent destruction of your ear drums are just a few of the things that make it unique. Capturing all that may be a challenge but I also believe that it can be done.
To capture the energy of the performances I experimented with wide angle shots but pretty much scrapped them all in favor of the close tight frame. I feel like it amplifies the motion of the performers and provides a unique perspective that is actually something you don’t get attending a live show. I’ll keep the wide angle shots but I don’t anticipate using much of them. I played with motion, trying to move in organic ways to feel the rhythmic bob of the crowd. This was very difficult to do while also trying to keep the subjects in focus but In the dozen hours of footage I got it right enough times to have plenty of options. Framing the subject was fun to play with, so many options when you can wander around a new venue each night and find angles. Getting footage while not distracting the crowd was another consideration. A camera floating around the stage is hard not to look at, and a camera behind your head causes most people to freeze if they notice it. I just kept moving and used more zoom, it worked well enough.
Overall, I feel good about what I captured and hope to get many more projects similar to this. The footage probably won’t be released anytime soon since it was captured for a later project. But in the meantime I pulled some stills that I will put on my website and that Marble will be sharing. Stay tuned…
Red Room Music video
Red Room, That’s a wrap!
The couple hours of Red Room footage is all chopped up and smooshed together into something 4 minutes! I watched it a good dozen times, showed it to a few people with opinions I respect, and I just don’t think there is anything left to do to the damn thing. I’m really happy to have it completed, and on April 2nd we can show it off to everyone.
This project as a whole felt like quite a success. I planned the concept and shooting from a thousand miles away, while MARBLE (Chantel and Matthew) did a lot of the leg work. They found the actors and locations and sent me pictures so that I could work out the best way to film it. MARBLE really gave me my dream project. Red Room is my favorite song off the new album and they told me to pitch them whatever crazy idea I could come up with. I have always enjoyed music videos with stories that move and match to the music and this song gave me such a clear picture of the story I wanted to tell. I was overjoyed when it fit their vision as well.
The two days it took to get the actual footage went by quickly and every problem that came up was immediatly taken care of. We had one actor back out at the last second, the coffee shop was missing all of the seating because of covid, the blood recipe turned out difficult to get consistent, and we changed the location of the morning scene last minute (Thanks for letting us mess up your house Josh Perrault)
Special thanks to Anchored Ship Coffee in Ballard for being so incredibly accommodating. They did everything possible to help with our shoot, going out of their way to help stage the scene and keep customers out of the shots. Larry’s Tavern in West Seattle opened specifically for us with Ian Carey playing a cameo in the restaurant. The space was great, the cameo was great and the drinks afterwards were great. Joel Phillips turned out to be the perfect person to play the lead role. He instinctively understood the direction I wanted from the character and he only gave me quality material to work with. I had so many clips of him upset, annoyed, distracted and pissed off, it was surprisingly easy to build the final cut.
This is my first completed film for Day Museum. I have another music video with MARBLE in the works and a few short films in production. I’m going to keep this momentum going so there should be much more to see very soon. To keep up find my Instagram or Facebook page. Or just keep checking back to this website, it will all be updated regularly.