Some movie critics should be jobless.

Ok, 
Before i begin this blog post, let me state that this is nothing more than a rant. I will be ranting for this entire post, and if you have a problem with that... then mosy on. Most of what I'm about to say will have no intellectual value. I just feel the need to rant for a little about something that is really grinding my gears. If any of this offends you, or your didn't like the movie INCEPTION, wander elsewhere on the interwebs please.

A visual representation of my frustration can be seen below:

Now, some might say 84%? What's so special about that? Why take the time to take a screen capture and put it in a blog? Well, I'll tell you why. This movie was worthy of 84% before the opening title's even began. If it were possible, this movie would be worthy of 110%. This movie is practically flawless, and any flaws that may be there if you were ever so scrupulous, only serve to make the movie seem better and more accessible. Never has there even been a more artfully done, suspenseful, accessible, and respectable summer blockbuster. I've seen a lot of movies, and this one is definitely one of the most flawless.

Now, while i understand that this may just be my opinion (which it is), and I could just as easily make the same argument about... say... The Nutty Professor, I still feel that I'm right. I also understand that you don't care what I think. Maybe you hate the movie. But let's take a look at another source where the score isn't calculated by crusty old pompus critics with no sense of self-respect. 

There, now that's more like it. Now, IMDb's rating system is severely flawed. It's actually pretty terrible. But i feel like in some ways it's a little bit better than rotten tomatoes. This isn't a rating compiled by some lemon-sucking chin-stroking pretentious never-make-my-own-art criticizers. This is a rating that consists of everyone who has seen the movie and taken the time to rate it. 

There are 5,123 votes there. I'd say, out of that... at-least 300 of them saw Twilight: Eclipse and liked it. So, you get those people in there. The people who don't usually like good movies (which is the only group that would like Twilight... a bit harsh? I think not). It's just more of a melting pot. Everyone can be ag critic on IMDb. 

Also, i just want to state that rottentomatoes has never done me wrong. Technically, it didn't here either. But, i just can't stand a website where some of these people's opinions actually mean something. Here, let me show you some examples.

Dear Mr. Steve Rhodes,

You are an insult to mankind. There were AT MOST three or four shooting scenes in the movie Inception. If you took all the material from the movie, and cut out all the part's that didn't involve shooting... you'd have a three minute long movie. It would be a giant load of crap. Like your review. 

Here are a few movies that Steve Rhodes gave a positive rating:

- The BlindSide

- Alien Trespass (got 33%)

- Confessions of a Shopaholic

- Yes Man

Another movie he gave a negative rating:

- The Dark Knight

Clearly, Steve Rhodes opinion is about as useful as a crap flavored lollipop. 

I hear The BlindSide is riveting on Blu-ray, go watch that and stay away from good movies.

Oh Gary. Gary Gary Gary. 

Maybe if you had a different face I'd go easy on you.

But unforunately, you don't. Maybe you need a different brain too. Because this movie was not confusing. It was progressively explained. The whole movie is explained by the end. Bit for Bit. Not a single plot-hole comes to mind. I'm very critical of plot-holes, and watched as hard as ever for them, but not a single one. Let's take a look at some movies that Gary Wolcott likes to watch on those lonely confusing nights.

Movies with a positive rating:

- The sorcerers apprentice

- Knight and Day

- Prince of Persia

- Shrek Forever After

- Letters to Juliet

- Date Night

- She's Out Of My League

- Robin Hood

Movies with a negative rating:

- INCEPTION

- Shutter Island

- The Road (he thinks it was too sad... poor guy)

- Where the wild things are

So, as you can see... this guy is in no position to give his opinion on a film. He liked ROBIN HOOD. If i were his boss, the second he came out with that review... I would tell him to pack his things. I can't stand to live in a world where a critic gave Robin Hood a better rating than Inception, and his opinion actually means something and is calculated into a (subjective and non-scientific) rating for the movie.

So yeah. Like i said. Just a rant. Maybe you liked Inception. Maybe you didn't. That's okay. To each his own. But i really feel like there are some movie critics that should immediately lose their job. I can't stand their need to come up with some clever little jokey way to say why they hated it. Take a piece of art and turn it into a vain little attention getter. Forget them.

Also, i want to clarify that if you liked some of these movies it's not a bad thing. I'm not busting on blind side. I haven't even seen it. It's just... for someone to say that Blind Side is a good movie and that Inception is not... that's where i have an issue.

Man, I feel better now. 

Images taken for www.imdb.com and www.rottentomatoes.com (both great sites)

Happy fourth of July!

Just wanted to share you guys with a nice look at how we spent our July 4th this year. 


AMERICA - A July 4th Celebration from NewSpeak Media on Vimeo.



Once again, definitely stretched the 7d to it's limits as far as low-light goes. 

My Beautiful Idol - Take Away Show

Hey guys,


Just wanted to share a video that we did the other day.




This is Austin Black from the band Domestic Sleepless performing "My Beautiful Idol" from their upcoming record "Night". 


This video was fun because a big part of the reason it was made is because we had just gotten a new camera (canon 7d) and wanted to test out it's low-light capabilities. So we put my friend Austin (who just happens to be incredibly musically gifted and has an awesome band called Domestic Sleepless) in a room with one very dim light, and had him perform one of his new songs. We're pretty proud of the result. We shot it from the same angle three times, and used audio from one take. He played to a click track so all of the takes were able to sync but only sorta. This creates a jarring and unsettling effect, that we thought kind of captures the feel of the song. 

The Great Bridal Expo of Dallas, and my late new years resolution.

Hello Everyone,
Before I go into this blog post, I want to say that I have been incredibly lazy with this blog thus far. For that, I apologize. We have been pretty slammed with various projects and random things going on. For a while I had completely forgotten about it. But, I decided to make a new years resolution a month late to actually put the time into this that it deserves. So, I want all of you who read this to hold me accountable :-). I just usually put more of my mental real estate towards getting client projects done and keeping them satisfied, sometimes I slack on the social media side of things. BUT NO LONGER!

Anywho,
Last weekend, NewSpeak Media had the wonderful pleasure of running a booth at The Great Bridal Expo of Dallas. It really was a great day. We got to meet a lot of great people and prospective clients, which was really useful, but we also got a better feel for the industry. It was our first time at one of those things. Previously, we had been working in the background taking gigs from word of mouth (as far as weddings go). But we decided that this year we would work more on the wedding side of things. Don't get me wrong, music videos are fun, but we've had a few unpleasant encounters when it comes to payment. Not to mention, weddings yield a much more rewarding and enjoyable experience most times. We love the prospect of providing couples with the ability to rewatch and relive the most important day of their lives. Anywho, enough of the mushy stuff. Haha.

 

This is Todd right after we finished setting up the booth

He's texting on his droid. If you don't know what that is, 

then ask him about it... he'll be more than willing to talk

for way too long about it.

Set up went sooo fast. We got there wayy to early. I'm pretty sure we were the first booth to completely set up. I think Todd had misread the itenerary a bit, because from where the rest of us were sitting, there was definitely the potential for at-least another hour of sleep. 

 

Todd and Caleb at the booth. 

For this being our first booth, we were really proud of the design. We thought it had a very classy and minimalist yet homey kind of look. Professional, but not intimidating. 

 

Here's the whole crew. From left to right it's Lauren,

Todd, Caleb, then Austin. 

We decided on four people to run the booth. Which admittedly was probably too much. But we won't lie, it was nice to be able to rotate and send someone out to get lunch when we all got hungry. So it definitely worked out. 

This was around when people started coming in. Very

pleased with the attendance at the event.

It was really cool, the company next to us didn't show. So we got to steal half of their booth. They also paid for power, so we were able to plug in one of our big lights to brighten up our booth a bit. So that was just a nice bit of luck.

All in all, it was a very good day. We hope to do many of these in the future. Hopefully we'll see some of you there!

Something BIG? EX1-R?

Well folks,
There is something looming. Something big. For the past couple of weeks i've been reading little tid bits of information stating that something big from sony is in the works. I've read things from rumors that the ex1/3 would be discontinued soon. Also, that there might be a new better version in the works called the EX1-R. Who knows what it may be. Maybe it's a new camera with a sensor more along the lines of what the new DSLR's are coming out with. Maybe an EX-1 style camera with interchangeable lenses? Who knows. But everyone says it's going to be big. Sony has an e-mail list that you can sign for to recieve the big news as soon as it's released. You can sign up HERE . The only thing i can assure you of, is that it's coming out the 20th of this month (the information, not the product). All of Sony's promotional materials state "YOU SPOKE! WE LISTENED!". It really sounds promising. I just want a bigger chip, and interchangeable lenses. Basically, something along the lines of the 7d's sensor size for the better latitude, but the ability to do everything a traditional camera can do (ie. good audio, etc). Well, lets just wait and see.

As soon as we know, we'll post everything we've got for you here.




AMENDMENT: This announcement came out long ago. It wasn't that big of a deal. Just wanted to clear that up.

Adobe Story - Pre-Pro for the Creative Suite

Adobe Story - Adobe's New Screenwriting Software (BETA)

The preview version of this software can be accessed  Here

Today I tried the "preview" version of Adobe Story. This is a new screenwriting software developed to be included in the Adobe Creative Suite. It's pretty basic. However, the version i tried is noted as being the "preview" version, and it's browser based at this point. I'm pretty pleased that Adobe has decided to take a step into the "pre-production" part of the film-making and video process. However, so far it seems a little bit... thin. Initially, i found it a bit hard to navigate. While this may be part of the preview version (which discounts any real serious thoughts about this review as a means of decision making, rendering it only useful as a preview as well), I kept wanting to switch back over to my usual program Celtx (which can be downloaded for free here: http://celtx.com/ ). Celtx just seems a bit more user friendly. The scripting process in story so far doesn't seem as quick. Or as quick to learn at least. I'm sure there are a lot of shortcuts that i haven't picked up on yet. Either way, it's a cool addition to the creative suite. However, i still feel like Celtx is the better tool. With all of it's shortcuts and compatibility. I'm still interested to see how other people like it when the final version comes out.

 This is another view of story's GUI. The all projects view shows you all of your scripts as well as character bios, and other info.

This is  the script editor view. With quick access to other scripts, as well as options to import other types of files etc.

Show Reel

This is our new show reel. Be sure to watch it full screen. Sorry, i'm a stickler for that. It's the only way to watch something.

 

It doesn't quite encompass everything we do. I would like to keep weddings seperate as well. However, we felt it was a good start. We're already hard at work with a new concept. We want to add more of our client work. We have done a few more projects worth showing off since when we created this reel. Also, on the next time around, we're going to keep the wedding stuff seperate. That way people interested in weddings know what we're about and people who want our other more varied client work (music videos, commercials) can see that seperately. Either way, let us know what you think.