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R.I.P. Bill Hinzman, Happy Birthday George A. Romero and Streebo gets Exploited on Mutantville Mondays!

Mutantville Productions would like to take a moment of silence to honor the passing of Bill Hinzman the man famous for portraying the first zombie seen in George A. Romero’s Night of the Living Dead. MVP would like to send our sincere condolences to Hinzman’s friends and family.

Get the rest of your Monday fix after the leap!
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Streeborama Goes to The Outer Limits for a VHS Unboxing!

There’s a lot of activity going on behind the scenes on the Mutantville Mothership this week.  I originally thought to do another Streebo v-log for Streeborama today because I have a lot of things I want to get off my chest about indie filmmaking and horror fandom in general.  I was tied up doing readings last night for an upcoming project at MVP so I didn’t have time to shoot my incindiary v-log yet. 

Instead, I am going to share a gentler, kinder video of my Outer Limits unboxing.  Back at Halloween I scored a complete set of the original Outer Limits television show on VHS.  I shot the special unboxing to share the sights and sounds of it all with you. 

I’ll work on my crazy v-log for next week – but this week you can enjoy a nice gentle unboxing.  Cheers to ya.

Full unboxing video after the leap!

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Mutant TV turns 400 on Streeborama!

This week on Streeborama, we’re celebrating the 400th episode of Mutant TVwith a special Streebo Q&A session.  In this long awaited Q&A, Streebo answers all of your questions about filmmaking, horror and MVP in addition to drawing the names for the Fangoria giveaway. You’ll have to watch the whole video to find out if you won. You can watch it just after the leap!
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Homer with MVP’s Inspirational Filmmaking Quote of the Week.

In honor of The Immortals coming out in theaters across the nation, this week we thought we would go old school with a quote from the great poet Homer. What better to get you through the day than some wisdom of the ages?

“Light is the task where many share the toil.”
~~Homer

De-Stress with Geo – 20 Ways to Relax

Sounds kind of odd doesn’t it. Oh well. This post is about getting rid of some stress. Any one in filmmaking goes through some stress. Working with other people in general can cause stress and the time crunches on set, flakiness(not like a biscuit), dead lines, different areas of production, different departments, everything coming together at a specific time, etc… is enough to make you need some serious medications. So you need a way to relax and get rid of stress or you will explode.

We all have our ways to relax…whether it’s watching movies(pretty normal for filmmakers for obvious reasons), being outdoors, exercising, shooting black tar heroin, going shopping, listening to music, playing music(one of my personal favorites), dancing, playing video games, I think you get the idea. All of these things keep us sane and if we run ourselves all the time, we don’t do these things and it affects our craft and our relationship with everyone else in our lives because we become moody and mean.

Learn some ways to relax after the leap!
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John Carpenter with MVP’s Inspirational Filmmaker Quote for Halloween!

“I have always had different aspects to my personality. I think I’m a long-term pessimist and a short-term optimist. I do feel a great darkness about humanity. But — simultaneously and contradictorily — I also feel that life can be pretty fabulous. I should also express some of that in my work; I don’t want to limit myself as a filmmaker. I want to be true to the parameters of all films. They should create a mood and tingle you emotionally. That is what I’m after. I want the audience to experience some feeling. I want them to know they’re alive.”  ~~John Carpenter

 

Be sure to check back to Mutantville.com this Friday when we release our exclusive interview with John Carpenter. You can watch it free online right here on Mutantville.com.

Robert W. Filion chosen as Inspirational Filmmaker of the Week!

Mutantville Productions first learned of Robert W. Filion during our epic adventure to take Devil Comes Down to George A. Romero’s American Zombie Film Contest in 2009. During said contest Robert’s movie, See The Dead, went on to sweep his competitors into the grave including MVP’s own Devil Comes Down. Robert reaped the rewards of the contest and MVP was left rubbing our collective bruised egos and has been plotting revenge ever since.

Over the years, MVP has come to know and respect Robert as a man of many talents.  Robert follows MVP’s filmmaking philosophy in that he is always ready to do whatever needs to be done to get his movies made whether it’s working as the writer, director, producer, director of photography, editing or doing his own digital FX.  Robert is a filmmaker with twenty years of experience and any time he brings his considerable talents to bear it is always worth taking notice. Most recently, See The Dead played at the prestigious Nevermore Film Festival at the Carolina Theatre in Durham, NC.

Robert’s company Image Impact Group has been responsible for countless shorts and films over the years including Lot 66, Chekov’s Children, The Promise Jar and The Parcel.  Robert never seems content to create run of the mill horror, instead he always tries to push the boundaries of the art-form technically as well as through the narrative.  His films may feature undead, zombies and other sorted beasts of mayhem – but there is always an attempt to marry the surreal or psychological to the narrative.

In a recent interview with Fangoria magazine, Filion states that “I find the scariest place to navigate is my own head.  I was raised in a military family and never had longterm friends, so I never really fit in, since we moved around a bunch. Though very outgoing, I found the cruelty of children a bit much to take. Even back then, I wrote stories of a fantastical nature and retreated into my own world.”  Filion comments that “people are emotionally fragile, and the question I come up with time and again is, what if you push the right buttons?”

Years later, the stars would align as MVP and Filion no longer found themselves at odds, instead teaming to create a new horror anthology entitled Tales From Mutantville. This past October, Robert teamed with Mutantville Productions to shoot three short films back to back.  Producer J.T.McRoberts commented on working with Filion by saying that “Robert is an inspiration to work with.  He is very professional and possesses a drive and determination to create something new and exciting.  He may know how to do everything that needs to be done on a film set from production manager to gaffing and beyond but he never lets work get in the way of having a good time on the set.  Working with him was a real blast and I look forward to future collaborations.”

Never one to rest on his laurels, Robert has been keeping busy with projects such as Seeing and is still currently in post-production on Indigo Child for Tales From Mutantville.  This weekend he is hosting a private screening of his latest project Ghost Trek. Ghost Trek was developed by writer/co-director Michael Plumides and stars Michael Melendez, Johnny “Fairplay” Dalton, Mikey B. Bartone, Gia Allemonde, Christy Johnson, and Addy Miller (of The Walking Dead).

For his dedication and professionalism to the art and craft of filmmaking, MVP is proud to chose Robert W. Filion as the inspirational filmmaker of the week.

Streebo and Todd Go Scarecrow Shopping.

Build a Steadicam

If you’re like me, you’re probably not a big fan of shakey camera work. A little is cool, but not “Cloverfield” style (at least not for me). One thing that the studios use is the steadicam. Of course if you’re shooting with low or no budget, you can’t afford one of these big pimpin’ Steadicams like the one in the pic. You can however make something that does a decent job with some time and a little money. When shooting “C for Chaos” we made a simple Steadicam to use with the Cannon GL-1. The new Panasonic DIVX-100B is heavier so I’ve been looking for something different to try.

These links all go to video tutorials. Each sort of has their own build type. Some are straight out counter balances some are more complex. Check ‘em out and let me know what you think!

This first video is a tutorial for how we built the steadicam we used. It’s a good tutorial that shows how to build a steadicam with some pipe and fittings. Very easy DIY project!

How to build a pro level steadicam for $14 | Video « Wonder How To

Build a pro level steadicam for $14 |► Steadicam is important in filmmaking and can help you get the perfect shot. If you are a budding filmmaker and don’t have the cash to shell out for a professionally made model, check out this …

Steadicam – build story « gadas.eu

I have completed my in-house small project building the Steadicam from scratch. This is the 2nd try. 1st one was not so very successful or better say stable. 1st try was based on very small u-joint. I kept the old one: …

DIY Merlin Steadicam Camera stabilizer with test footage | Diy …

Josh, thanks for the great tutorial. It was probably the easiest one to build on Youtube. It works pretty well when perfectly balanced, and that’s where the problem lies. DIY steadicams take a long time to fine tune. …

This one looks pretty Awesome, but not so easy to build. Plus not as cheap.

*UPDATED* How to build a DIY $100 Merlin-type Steadicam camera stabilizer that really works.

The Jaybilizer 3000 started out as a DIY Merlin-type Steadicam project. I wanted something that was better than the barbell on a stick type of camera stabilizer but not as expensive as a Steadicam Merlin or even a GlideCam 1000. I assembled a couple …

Point Pivot Steadicam design

This video demonstrates a steadicam rig that I designed and built for about $12. It utilizes a unique “point-pivot” which eliminates the need for mechanical gimbals, reducing costs and maintaining a full range of motion. Shoot me a message if you are…

I hope this helps to have several styles of steadicams to build in one spot. Please let me know if you’ve built any of these or if you have a video walking people through how to build a steadicam. I’ll check it out and possibly add it.

Thanks!

Vampire Narc

Let’s set the wayback machine for 1991 as we check out an early Mutantville Production written and directed by our very own make-up FX jedi Todd A. Britt and starring none other than a bodacious young Brent Bowers as the titular Vampire Narc! This is exploitation filmmaking at it’s finest.