Listen Carefully...

"When you hear what we've done, Nick... Just you wait--"

That was Devin's voice on the phone to me last week as I went to visit him and Mike on one of their final sound editing sessions before our mix. He was referring to the last few minutes of the film -- the ending. An ending that, in order to be pulled off right, requires the perfect combination of performances, music and sound design. I had been waiting two years to hear the last few minutes of the film the way I did last week and all I can say at this stage is... Mike and Devin were right. It packs a seriously powerful punch. I am so proud of the work and bravery every one has put forth to make this ending (and the entirety of the film) such an intricate and layered piece, and I hope it will churn many discussions amongst audience members as the end credits roll, set to a song I am so proud and honoured to be including in this film (more on that... later!)

I am so incredibly impressed with the work these two gentlemen have done. The care and thought they have put into every sound and every edit is incredible and truly shows as the intensity and rate or your heart rises over the course of William's Lullaby. Sound Design has always been an important factor for me with this film, along with music. It is the missing layer -- the layer of story that brings it all together and truly makes it click for an audience. Mike and Devin have gone above and beyond what is written in the script and have added a layer of subtext and subliminal foreshadowing into the film that will take multiple viewings to unravel. That's Sound Design with purpose and I love it. One of my early talks with Mike discussed how Sound Design was done on The Sixth Sense, a film I have mentioned on here in the past. For those of you that do not know (and I hope this isn't giving anything away), The Sixth Sense follows a young boy who has the ability to speak to the dead. What the sound designers did on that film was brilliant. If you strip the dialogue, strip the foley, strip the music and leave only the ambience -- crank it up, what you are hearing; that hum, that buzz, is the sound of hundreds of people breathing. Of course, this would be next to impossible to figure it out if it weren't for the filmmakers saying it in interviews, but it is chilling to know that even in scenes where Bruce Willis or Haley Joel Osment are alone, you are hearing multiple breaths along with theirs -- there is an added presence. And it adds a layer of sophistication to that movie. Similar to how Hans Zimmer used a switch-blade dragging across the strings of a Cello to compose his theme for the Joker in The Dark Knight. Using this as inspiration, Mike and Devin have added original and unique, subtle details to their sound design. I can't tell you more without giving away crucial plot points. But when the time comes and you are sitting in a theatre, viewing our film -- listen carefully!

We will be heading in to our final mix session next week, and as we do, I find myself reflecting back on this process. The end is near -- or is it really the beginning? True, I would probably compare this process more to the birth than anything else. It's just been a really long labour. While work is still being done on colour and minor touch-ups happening here and there, Mike and Devin will be done their work on William's Lullaby by the end of the month. For Mike this is a big deal especially as he has, in a way, been a part of this journey since its conception - back when I emailed him a 140 page script called Ducklings and Swans.

William's Lullaby has always been there. For the last two years, it's been sitting here, waiting for me while I'm at work, stirring in my mind as I sleep. It's always been that 'unfinished symphony.' It's been incredible watching people grow over the course of this adventure, watching friendships strengthen, talents develop, and watching the film itself take shape. We've learned a lot and there is certainly much more to learn in our journey as artists. William's Lullaby is just a stepping stone, for all of us -- but we'd like to think it's a big one.

Patiently, and methodically, we will continue our work over the next few weeks -- perfecting what we have designed and built over the last two years so that it is the best it can possibly be within our ability. And when the time comes for us to sit back and close the book on this chapter, expect an even sappier post from me here. From there, we will breathe life into the film -- a project in and of itself, one that could take another two years to reach its maximum potential. Who knows? That's why I tend to compare filmmaking to having a child (like I could even begin to know what that's like!) but there are similarities. If these next few weeks are the birth, then the next two years are going to be the most crucial as we help the film grow and develop into the piece of cinema it is going to be.

Stay tuned! It's about to get exciting!

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N.

The Splinter House

Things are moving along quite nicely. I am happy to say that Paul Barton has completed the William's Lullaby score and it is truly exquisite. He has done an incredible job of incorporating the themes and story of William's Lullaby in his music and the result is a sophisticated and layered score that will keep you thinking long after the film is over.

I'll be spending quite a bit of time in these blogs speaking about creating the look of William's Lullaby in various posts. I've already begun to do that with last week's post on the transition from storyboards to screen. This week we'll take a look at the William's Lullaby set and specifically creating the look of the Splinter home.

I've always been a fan of art direction and set design. I love the idea of bringing a character to life through his or her surroundings in a play or film. I've mentioned my Vancouver Film School short, "The Boy Who Knew" on here before, but I'll take a moment to show it again in a different light. This was a film where I wanted to explore how you could create a character simply through set design and art direction without ever showing that person in the film. Can it be done effectively? You be the judge.

For the record, in reality this bedroom was originally a teenage girl's room, complete with a bunk-bed. My Art Director at the time, Red Albert, did a phenomenal job, in my biased opinion of transforming this into the bedroom of a boy prodigy and it fits well with the mood of the final product:

For William's Lullaby, I assembled a small team of extremely creative filmmakers and artists from Kingston, Ontario. Together we worked hard over five months of pre-production to create some of the very specific details needed for the Splinter home. Our goal was to create a home that was missing two crucial ingredients -- love and family. 

For William's bedroom (as seen above) we decided that a running theme throughout his environment would be a love for medieval knights and mythology, and this can be seen subtly with everything from the frame of the bed, the royal bedsheets, the knight's helmet on his dresser to the hand-drawn images of kings hanging on the wall. At the same time, we wanted William's bedroom to be very stark and bare, cold and unwelcoming -- as though slightly unfinished. The baron white walls leave much to be desired, casting harsh dark shadows which we can only imagine would terrify a young five-year-old in the dark.

For our next image we see the Splinter basement:

The script originally called for a living room environment, describing Thomas as often sleeping on the couch. During our location scout, this house provided us with an unfinished basement that peaked our curiosity and provided a much darker, sombre environment for Thomas. It made perfect sense to us that this man, suffering from depression and perhaps even a fear of raising his own son would create a safe haven from that world, a sanctuary of his own, off limits to his young five-year-old son where lost memories and ghosts abound in photo albums and home video flickers in the night light.

Thomas' bedroom had to have the same stark, bare and cold feeling of William's but on a very different scale -- from the adult perspective. And my art team, made up of the wonderfully talented Amanda Shaw, Kat Rush and Sierra Chaykowski did a wonderful job of adding subtle details, bringing to life Thomas Splinter's past AND present in one single room. Fantastic work, if you ask me. I won't spoon-feed you, rather I'll leave you to explore the clues. Very telling reveals of character in these pictures.

That's it for this week folks! Remember to join in the conversation on FACEBOOK, TWITTER and comment below! We love to hear from you.

N.

From the Pen to the Screen

We have been working like crazy these last few weeks and will continue to for the next while as we near the finish line. Mike and Devin are working hard on preparing the film for a pre-mix and I'll be sitting down with Paul Barton in the coming weekend to go over the score in what will possibly be our final spotting session.

Meanwhile, on my end we've been colour balancing the film and preparing it for grading. Amazing progress has been made in regards to licensed music and we have a few surprises for everyone that we will reveal in due time. Biggest lesson here is -- never give up and exhaust all resources. Never assume the answer is 'no.' You will be surprised at what happens when you simply ask.

Gary Carr also began work on the end credits of the film. He is responsible for the ghostly "William's Lullaby" that appears in our teaser, using Leslie Martin's design. So to make a long story short, the end is in sight and the pieces are falling into place. But we are all aware of the fact that it is going to take a great deal of work in the coming months to get there. Game on.


A few posts back, I talked about how I storyboarded the entire film prior to casting as a way of preparing myself mentally for the task of bringing the visual style of the film to life. I thought I'd do a little less talking in this post and show you some examples of how those storyboards influenced the final product. If you take anything away from this post, it's that you don't need to be a great artist to storyboard -- stick figures will do! It's the idea that counts.

In most cases I was able to use stills from my location scout to visually lay out my shots. I would read the script line by line and picture the film, cut together in my head. What did I visually see? I would then do a few rough outlines, then pen the final drawing. Spending a great deal of time on each frame allowed me to really contemplate my reasoning for that shot and as you can see, for the most part, I stuck with that blueprint once I got to set.

As you can see in this scene, Richard and Toby bring a great deal of life to the image that I, unfortunately, can't quite express with my pen. Often, their motivation for blocking and action dictated slightly different camera positions and movements as seen by the slight difference between what is going on in my storyboard vs. the final scene.

Again, we were quite flexible with straying from the drawn image once we got to set but you can see that the essence of it is still there. Toby is a ball of energy and his jumping up onto the bed (as seen in the final scene) is far more dynamic than what's on the page and offers more excited camera movements to match his energy.

I said I wouldn't talk much in this post. I lied. There you have it. An example of just how much storyboarding helped me, and continued to help me in the editing room.

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Haven't seen our teaser yet? You can WATCH IT HERE

Comment below!

N.

Casting William's Lullaby

Hi folks!

This week, we're taking a look at the casting process of William's Lullaby and what it was like for us to be first introduced to Toby Bisson, Richard Roy Sutton and the rest of our cast.

But first... We have begun colour grading William's Lullaby and it is incredible the difference it makes. I am very excited with how it is turning out and I thought I would share a little "colour test" with you to give you an idea of the subtle differences that alteration in colour can make to a scene.

Rewind the tape to May, 2011 and we look back at William's Lullaby in its infancy. We began a casting call for William's Lullaby in Toronto and Kingston (where we planned on shooting the film) using print media, radio ads and online casting calls. At that point, all other roles had been cast either internally or, in some cases, prior to pre-production even starting. We were specifically looking for our two leads; Thomas and William Splinter. The result were numerous video submissions from actors and non-actors across Ontario.

From videos and online auditions, we moved on to casting in person and saw nearly 50 people for both leads. We were looking for something very specific in both characters. Both had to be likeable and sympathetic to an audience; and furthermore they had to be believable as father and son.

In walks young Toby Bisson.

Toby will correct me on this (because the difference IS a big deal) but I believe he was six at the time of auditioning for us. He had caught our eye earlier when a video was sent in to us of him dancing to the entirety of Michael Jackson's "Beat It" (air guitar and all) with a closing line of: "I'm Toby Bisson and I want you to pick me for your movie." In truth, he had won our hearts from that point on. And that feeling was further reinforced when we met him in person. He is the William on the page and demonstrated both a youth and maturity beyond his six years that would be required to take on a project of this scope.

This was Toby's first movie role and for those of you that have been following us on FACEBOOK or TWITTER, you know that he has been doing extremely well ever since.

Later that same day, Richard Roy Sutton owned the room and who knew at the time that these two would soon be playing father and son. Well, we did. Very quickly too.

Richard brought with him credentials, experience and tools as an actor with many credits to his resume, a full reel and a previous video audition in which he had already read scenes from the script.

Richard's read was without a doubt the best we had heard. I recall Alex McLean, our co-producer (who read opposite Richard in his audition) commenting after he left the room: "He stared into my soul!"

Two days later and after many hours of auditions and discussion, we made the calls and Toby Bisson and Richard Roy Sutton joined the William's Lullaby team. They became a part of the pre-existing cast that included Kingston's Partners in Crime duo, Ila Lawton and Robert Lawton in the roles of Collette and Peter, respectively. Amy Healey (who also sat in on casting) as the gracious and motherly kindergarten teacher, Mrs. Gibson. Peter Nielsen. Sandie Cond. Marc Veno. Gabe Meacher. Calvin Rea. Braedon Da Silva and many others.

Upon completion of the script, we had thought the roles would be impossible to cast and indeed they were our biggest challenge in the process (a five-year-old involved in intense scenes and carrying a feature-length film is not easy to find). But we had found our Thomas and William in Richard and Toby. And if we were excited with them then, our reaction after shooting the film in August 2011 was one of absolute glee and confidence.

N.

What Math Homework??

Hopefully we'll be able to post exciting updates on the progress of the film very soon. Mike Whissell (sound designer) and I are still hard at work fine-tuning some of the more intricate details of the film. Mike and I are itching to get a foley session going which will happen soon -- and we'll post an update once it does.

Paul Barton is progressing with the score and doing a fantastic job. I had the opportunity to meet with him in Kingston, ON over the holidays and heard a good chunk of what he had been working on. I am incredibly excited to share it with all of you. Those who have spoken to me in the past know how much music in film is important to me. And this film is no exception. It is called William's Lullaby, after-all.

This week, I wanted to take a moment and talk about how this all started in the first place. I will start off by saying that I think every artist has "their way." I don't believe there is a right or wrong way of going about creating art. I guess I'm saying that because I don't want to make it seem like I am putting myself on a pedestal as an 'expert.' In these blogs, I can only say what has worked for me as an artist.

Took a few days off this past week to work on an small outside project. While I did, I learnt a lot about the importance of prep and planning and it got me thinking about the beginning months of Lullaby.

Naivety was my best friend as a young filmmaker. Truly. Having that childlike naivety as a teenager is what allowed me to tackle some of the daunting projects I did back then. When I was fourteen-years-old I had the audacity to think I could make a feature length film with a cast and crew of over 100 people by the time I graduated school. Any film instructor would tell me today that in order to do so I would need a budget in the hundreds of thousands, a professional crew, gear, training etc... in other words, they would give me limitations. And on some level, they are right. Those are some of the things you need to produce a professional piece of work. But where there is a will, there is most definitely a way. And when you find you are restricted with your resources, planning becomes your best friend.

See, I was stubborn. Back in 2004, I hadn't made a dramatic film before, let alone a feature. A few docs here and there and a multitude of backyard films starring my siblings, sure. But nothing of this magnitude. Yet, I refused to take no for an answer and despite people telling me to start small, I committed to creating The Vicious Circle -- a feature length film on bullying and hatred.

I may have been naive, but I wasn't stupid. I had an inkling of how daunting this project was and knowing this, I gave myself the time to pull it off right. Four years really. When a merry band of high-school go-getters and I finally brought the project to life in our tenth grade year, we cast the film over a period of two months... 6 whole months prior to shooting it in the summer of 2006. During those 6 months we rehearsed heavily with our cast and planned every detail of the shoot, so that when July 1st, 2006 rolled along we were ready. 

Waylon Baur and Anthony Kinsella in a 2006 rehearsal for "The Vicious Circle."

Of course, we were still kids. Things still fell apart, we made tons of mistakes, but we managed to pull through and premiered the film on September 28th, 2007 to a sold out room in Duncan McArthur Auditorium in Kingston, ON.

Actor and Musician, Jim Patterson, speaks at the 2007 premiere of "The Vicious Circle"

Had we not planned -- truly done our homework -- over the course of our making of the film, I think The Vicious Circle would have fallen apart for good and never seen the flicker of the silver screen.

A film about kids, made by kids -- that was always the goal, and that's how the film will forever remain. Of course now that I have gone through school, learnt about filmmaking and begun to hone my craft through other projects, there are times when I look at The Vicious Circle and re-cut it in my head, even re-shoot it with more purposeful cinematography. I re-write the script in my mind. But I'll never touch it. Though it may not be a great showcase of my skills today, it is a wonderful time capsule of where I was creatively at age 15, as well as what being a teenager is like through the eyes of teenagers -- quite literally (only fifteen/sixteen-year-olds peered through that lens.) And I like to think that there's something quite powerful in that.

Of course, pictures are always better than words. Here's a fun video that showcases the achievement of a group of teenagers, who did their "homework," and pulled off something memorable.

In the years since, I have directed more, worked on numerous projects and learnt more about my craft. Part of the reason I am so excited about Lullaby is that it truly showcases where I am at today with my filmmaking and storytelling. It is beyond what I have done before, professionally and creatively, and this again goes back to strategic homework and planning.

Between 2010 and 2011, it had been about a year and I hadn't directed anything. I did one quick short to keep my brain working, but other than that -- nothing. There came a point where I had to ask myself what I was doing -- what was I waiting for? I had a script. One that I had written while still in High school. Surprisingly, when I asked myself if I felt I could direct that script tomorrow, the answer was 'yes.' 

So what was I doing??

I was allowing $$$, $$$ to get in the way! Looking at the script again, I realized that, although being a complex story, it didn't require much to bring to life -- small cast, minimal locations. I looked back over an email Mike had sent me in 2008 when I wrote the first draft of the script. His email read:

"Nick, I just read the screenplay, I think it's great. I would love to work on it -- I don't know how we're going to do it. We'll need to do a lot of planning, but someway we'll make it work." 

That's the spirit!

Ensuring that, years later, Mike was still on-board, I took the plunge and in January 2011 committed to shooting William's Lullaby in late August. In the meantime I would plan and do homework like I never had before. Although William's Lullaby was already raking up dollars double that of The Vicious Circle, we still had to think creatively and economically with our pre-production.

One thing I did for the first time on this project, and will now continue to do for the rest of my directing career, is storyboard. I have storyboarded scenes/sequences in the past before, but never the entire film. Because I knew we would be shooting the film with little resources, a small crew, and a jam-packed schedule, storyboarding every shot of the film was, for me, an exercise in patience and truly helped me study every word of the script I had written. I was thinking about every shot of the film months prior to being on set. When the time came for me to stand and direct, I would know my script like the back of my hand. I would reach this level of understanding through hours and hours of storyboarding as I prepared for shooting.

The result was an enormous binder filled with over 400 frames. It became my bible on set. I would walk around with it and use it as a constant resource for myself and my actors. If ever there was a question as to why we were doing a certain shot, what it meant in the grand scheme of things, or what was ahead visually -- it was answered in the storyboards. Having done this much homework also allowed me to improvise on the day, if ideas came up from cast or crew or we wanted to try new things. I was comfortable enough in my planning to know when to be adventurous and try something risky.

This experience was invaluable and the result, I feel, is a meticulously-put-together film that is purposeful and well thought-out. I will storyboard again and again, on every project I direct, no matter how big or small. Perhaps I'm just a visual guy -- but this way of planning really works for me.

Of course, I could go on and on, talking about planning and homework. I could talk about re-writes, for which there were many. Rehearsals. Wardrobe/camera tests. Set sketches. Camera schematics etc... and perhaps I will down the road. 

Bottom line is, when you are against the odds with a project that seems larger than life or perhaps unattainable and beyond your means, giving yourself the time to strategize and make it happen is the key to success -- for me anyway.

As always, like us on FACEBOOK, follow us on TWITTER, share our blog and comment below! We welcome the discussion.

Bye for now.

N.

The Beginning of the End

Hey! Welcome to our blog!

If you've found us here, you're likely already following us on Twitter and liking us on Facebook. If you're not yet, be sure to check out those pages too for updates, videos, pictures and plenty more teases to come.

It's 11pm on a Friday night and I have hours of compositing ahead of me. Just waiting on a render. Though I must say that is not as much of a pain as it used to be thanks to Final Cut Pro X's background rendering. Back in September 2011, we made the decision to edit William's Lullaby on the new Final Cut Pro X, feeling that, despite mixed reviews, it would provide us with the appropriate tools we needed to complete the film and give it the polish we wanted -- and it hasn't disappointed. Sure, there have certainly been the odd hiccups and frustrations, the rare temptation to toss a computer monitor through a window or the flop sweat when you think you have backed your project into a corner it cannot escape, but we've made it through! The finish line is in sight. Still a ways to go, and still some time before we'll pull back the curtain on our baby. But we're getting there. And we're mighty proud and excited.

There are a total of 63 shots in the film requiring adjustments/compositing or additional things added to them/removed. Some were planned, others not so much, but this is all part of the process, albeit a tedious one at this point. We are about half-way through fixing up those shots at which point the locked picture will be ready for colour grading and correction. The edit itself has been locked since June 2012.

Meanwhile, my Sound Designer, Mike Whissell has been diligently putting together the Dialogue Edit, adding in the ADR (Automated Dialogue Replacement) that we recorded with our cast back in November.

We were graciously hosted by Zane at North of Princess Studios in Kingston, Ontario. Who knew that such a beautiful mixing and recording studio existed in the heart of the city?

Once that's complete, we'll move on to Foley (sound effects) and prepare the film for its sound mix. We both agreed from the beginning that the sound design in this film bears an enormous weight and so it has proven to take the longest in this filmmaking process and seems to be providing us with the most challenges -- in a good way! Mike has been with this project since its infancy (back when it was called "Ducklings and Swans"), so it truly is a pride and joy to work with him and see this project to completion together. You can keep up to date with Mike's progress on his website: http://www.karprecords.ca/

At the same time, I've struck gold with a talented young composer by the name of Paul Barton. The tracks he has been sending me are goosebump-inducing and completely capture the mood and theme of William's Lullaby. Hear a score he did for a brilliant short film by Kurtis Chen here: https://vimeo.com/33149647

Paul's Lullaby score is going to blow you away!



What I'd like is for this blog to be an open communication device between filmmaker and viewer. I'll keep you up to date on our progress, meanwhile, I'd like to hear from you! I value your support and interest in our film. And I'm not just saying that. Without you, this film collects cobwebs on a shelf. It happens more often than you think! This is a project that has been marinating with us for the last 6 years and we are eager to show it to you. Please share this blog, tweet, retweet, post -- do what you can and join in the discussion! Like on Facebook, follow us on Twitter and when the time comes, we hope to see you at a William's Lullaby screening in your neighborhood.

N.