Far Away and Never Alone

I hope Rachel doesn't mind me borrowing her Facebook album name for these pictures as the title...but it just fits so nicely! {Considering that you've watched our music video}

So, we stayed up all night filming the Tavern night scenes, and then got up early to film the outside morning scenes while the sunlight was beautiful (great rooster crowing and bird tweeting sound effects were abundant too!). In the movie, the morning scenes will come first.

The young Tavern maids doing their chores.

Mischievous Eleanor (Rachel Read).

Eleanor runs away.

The young Tavern maids search for Eleanor. The sash that Angela (center) is wearing is the first piece that Abigail and I wove on the table loom.

Young Tavern maids Colette (Abigail Read), Adelia (Angela Abbott) and Cecily (Mary Read) confront Eleanor.
Eleanor explains herself away.

Jasyar (Joseph Read) realizes there is a mysterious man in the corner watching him.

The ominous symbol tattooed on the bicep of Sarkov (Andrew Abbott) {Note: Just the work of my black ink and paintbrush ;-)}.

"I'm sure I've seen that symbol before..."

"Have you ever seen that man before?"

"That man? Sarkov? Never seen him before in my life!"(obviously, the teasing Tavern maid Eleanor doesn't give a wit. ;-)

Adelia makes up for it. "Actually, he comes here a lot, but he never eats...just sits there..."

Kinco (David Abbott), Jasyar's comrade. "Is he looking for someone specific?"

Constance (Amanda Read) fusses over the Tavern guests' menu.

"That man? He just takes up Tavern seating space and scares away the other guests!" The head Tavern mistress is no-nonsense and rather harsh!

Adelia.

Sarkov goes ballistic...and Andrew messed up the scene more than once by misunderstanding the use of the direction, "knock over the chess pieces". Of course, Rachel pranked him by pouring real wine in his Tavern glass, which might have made him a bit tipsy. Haha!

David just about had it with this scene.

Trivia: Over a dozen lit candles were used in the Tavern night scene.
Trivia: Amanda Read (age 19) is the camera director, but Abigail Read (age 12) takes her place when she is acting in a scene.

I've already added some of these screenshots to the Flickr album (which has a slide show on the sidebar). We improved the costumes...but I'll admit that they look much better on camera than they do in reality. The sewing machine all but broke down on us (it really needs a tune up), so we had to make do with what we had already completed before we couldn't stand using the thing anymore.

Coming Soon: Costume design drawings/paintings that I did of each of the characters...you might be surprised!

Also, Joseph and Andrew have a light saber duel production of their own that I filmed and will be posted as soon as the editing is done. Also, check out this funny video on Andrew's YouTube of six year old David Read (who actually plays the role of young Jasyar in The Called and the Chosen) beating up boys twice his age: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fjnGa3D0wkU

~Amanda~

Medieval Dance Party

Before I get a chance to write up a long post detailing our latest filming events, here is a behind the scenes glimpse of what we did in costume before going on set (video edited by Rachel):




You see, it made our complexions robust and ruddy for portraying the medieval characters. ;-)

Toss the Tripod and Cut the Costumes!

This post is actually a little on the late side. The Abbotts visited the third weekend in April. I spent most of my time toting my laptop around to work on my final English assignments while fellowshipping as much as possible. The college assignments felt like a bit of an anchor at that particular time, but we did manage to get a little done...and I'm so looking forward to the next visit this Summer!

The Jasyar and Kinco costumes were completed, and thankfully they fit Joseph and David A. However, I made a tremendous goof on the Sarkov costume. I only had the dark brown undershirt finished, and when we pulled it out of the bag it was much smaller than I remembered it! Andrew could only fit it over his head and get one arm through it. It was the last costume I made, so it is rather odd that I messed it up.

But I have a good excuse, I promise!

Actually, come to think of it, I was sewing it the last night of my Spring Break and had a History exam the next day, so I was probably costuming with more than half my brain tied behind my back. Thus, the costume I had intended to make for a 15 year old guy went to a 6 year old guy: "little David" (as we call him to keep from confusing him with David A.), who plays young Jasyar.

We did manage to find the alternate Sarkov costume - an old red t-shirt we altered - and he tried that on along with the muslin outer jerkin designed for Kinco (note: the rugged, ripped look of the outfits is intentional).

The Abbott guys trying on costumes (Andrew-left, David-right). During filming David cleverly conceals his braces! You would never know he had them. Andrew thus far has worn a mask as Sarkov, so that hasn't been a challenge.

"You killed my father. Prepare to die."
Jasyar shows a rare grimace. Yeah, THAT'S what we're talking about, Joseph!

David Read dons his "young Jasyar" outfit.

The boys doing some prop shopping.

Since we didn't have all of the costumes made, we couldn't get a lot of filming done. We only got a few essentially screen-test worthy scenes of Jasyar and Kinco traveling silently through the woods. The lighting was great and we chose one of our more obscure trails as the setting. It had a very nice, mysterious forest feel to it.

Ignore the modern pants (and shoes) for the moment...the camera angle was suppose to conveniently overlook them until a more creative solution was developed.

As for filming lessons learned: I think my tripod qualms were officially confirmed. Our tripod is great for still photographs and the rare perfectly still distance shot, but beyond that it is a choppy, creaking pain to use. On top of that, you don't fully realize the choppy scrolling or annoying cranking sounds until AFTER you watch it on a larger screen with suitable speakers. All of the scenes in the trailer and music video were filmed without the tripod because otherwise flexibility was hindered. I attempted to give the tripod another chance this last time, but it really wasn't much help. I would much prefer to have a dolly of sorts that is smooth and easy to move around.

Rachel and Angela wrote a song together (beautiful piano music and lyrics!), and Abigail and Mary sang it along with them (even Beth tried to be a part of it!). Hopefully we will get a chance to record that and film the music video during the next visit.

I set up another website for Imaginate That: www.imaginatethat.wordpress.com.

Here are some photos from our very brief and casual photo shoot (Rex got in one of them!). I want to have more professional looking pictures one day (the self-timer doesn't always cut it)...but of course, we need to make our movies more professional looking too!

The musicians...oddly enough, they happen to be posing like The Beatles! I didn't even think of that when I took the picture.

Recently we've worked on planning out the rest of the script...and I need to get back to sewing costumes (need to start on the girls' costumes) and finding realistic props!

~Amanda~

Music Video!

Thanks to the creative persistence and genius of Rachel, we now have a great music video. Watch never before seen footage! :)


Better Music Video - The Called And The Chosen from Imaginate That! on Vimeo.

The music is "Never Alone" from the album, "The Heart of War" by Jonah33.

Celebrity Morph by MyHeritage

MyHeritage: Family trees - Genealogy - Celebrities

Notice how much Joseph Read looks like actor William Moseley (Peter Pevensie, The Chronicles of Narnia)! Sometimes the computer skips and you have to replay it in order to see the morph in slow motion.

Celebrity Morph by MyHeritage

MyHeritage: Family trees - Genealogy - Celebs

Notice how much David Abbott looks like actor Tom Welling (Clark Kent, Smallville)! Sometimes the computer skips and you have to replay it in order to see the morph in slow motion.

Costumes

This Spring Break, the Reads worked on designing and sewing costumes.

Here are some designs in pen-and-ink and watercolor that I drew and painted (click the images for a larger view):

Note: I referred to the guys' linen undershirts as "chemises" because I thought I saw a particular guy's medieval costume on the internet refer to it as that. Perhaps in Medieval days men and women's shirts were both referred to as that, but I found that nowadays it's generally referred to for only women's shirts. Sorry for the blunder, guys! :-)

The cast of characters is currently as follows:

Jasyar...Joseph Read.
Young Jasyar......David Read
Kinco...David Abbott
Sarkov...Andrew Abbott
Eleanor...Rachel Read
Adela...Angela Abbott
Colette...Abigail Read
Cecily...Mary Read
Constance...Amanda Read

_______________

"In the making" photos:(We set up our "Costume Shop" in the Guest House)

(The black suede will be for the guys' arm bands, and the chain part of Sarkov's costume)


~Amanda~