Diner of Death - Behind the Scenes
"Eating after Hours"
October 31st, 2006 Halloween morning. The third and biggest SG set from us was released today. This has to be hands down one of the most stressful shoots I have done in a long time. Hopefully the fans will like it. We ran into location problems, time constraints, and camera issues but in the end I think the final product came out really cool and will make the followers of our sets happy.
Where did we get the idea?
I honestly thought we were going to do a softer set. After the toughness of our first two sets I was planning on doing something a lot more quiet and gentle. I had some great suggestions from SG but it wasn't until I put out a call for our next model that the zombie idea stuck. Bailey sent me a message that said: "One word - Zombies"
Why Bailey?
Why the hell not? Honestly if you were going to cast a woman that had to kick ass and literally bare knuckle box her way out of a room would you choose anyone else? I am a pain in the ass when it comes to picking models. I want to believe that the girl can actually do what it is that we are taking photos of. I can totally see Bailey running around with a machete cutting arms and shit off! She also has a great ability when it comes to conveying emotions.
Who designed the effects?
This is the third time I teamed up with the great Larry Sampson. He did the effects and production design on the other two shoots as well as this one and does an amazing job! Funny thing is that he was a horror/gore kid growing up. So bloodying up naked chicks wasn't a hard sell. Larry had a whole team working with him this time creating props and weapons. Bailey's sword is actually a pizza cutting knife! I worked with Shannon on costumes for the first time with this set. I wanted to put Bailey in a old "Flo" style waitress uniform(I had a vision of her as a worn out double shift waitress at some middle of nowhere truck stop.) Getting our hands on the right looking outfits was tough, Shannon ended up custom tailoring and dying white nurse uniforms and they looked perfect! Both girls ended up keeping the outfits (you should have seen Bailey walking down the street at 5am in her blood covered costume.) Bailey has put hers up for sale on ebay so if you guys want a piece of the action check it out:
Where did we shoot?
For those of you who know Boston might be able to recognize Herrell's Renaissance Caf in Allston.
Who are the Zombies?
The first thing I had to clear with SG was putting other people in the set. If you are gonna do a shoot about zombies then we need to see what they look like. Casting was as easy as you would think. What would you say if someone asked you "Hey you wanna get dressed up in the coolest Halloween costume ever and tear clothes of a chick?" We had a few cameos. The Mohawk zombie was played by Rick from the band BADASH http://www.myspace.com/badashrocks . He is not a stranger to effects and recently opened for GWAR! If you are a fan of "Starvin' with Louis" then look closely at the final zombies and you might recognize one of them. The fist zombie killed in the jumpsuit was my uncle! He has played a zombie in every one of my horror films. I called him up two days before. I hadn't spoken to him in over a year and the first thing he said was: "You need me to bring back the dead right?". It took me a minute to explain that it was for a photo shoot not a film and when he found out it was for SG he said: "I'll take my heart medicine and we will be all set!"
So what is next?
We have a few ideas kicking around and some SG's that we are very excited to work with. When we start shootingwell soon.
This was also the first SG set that had trailers and teasers made for it. SG made an official one that was released on youtube three days before and has gotten all sorts of best of notes:
I also put one together and got their blessing to release it as well:
High Res for you Image Junkies!
Oh and how many of you spotted the car fire? Look again.
Thanks for watching.
Mike
P.S. Feel free to talk to the other Crew Members on SG:
Production design: droctopus
SG Make-up Artist & Hair: Raedyn
Lighting Tech: dozer138
PA: section8
"Eating after Hours"
October 31st, 2006 Halloween morning. The third and biggest SG set from us was released today. This has to be hands down one of the most stressful shoots I have done in a long time. Hopefully the fans will like it. We ran into location problems, time constraints, and camera issues but in the end I think the final product came out really cool and will make the followers of our sets happy.
Where did we get the idea?
I honestly thought we were going to do a softer set. After the toughness of our first two sets I was planning on doing something a lot more quiet and gentle. I had some great suggestions from SG but it wasn't until I put out a call for our next model that the zombie idea stuck. Bailey sent me a message that said: "One word - Zombies"
Why Bailey?
Why the hell not? Honestly if you were going to cast a woman that had to kick ass and literally bare knuckle box her way out of a room would you choose anyone else? I am a pain in the ass when it comes to picking models. I want to believe that the girl can actually do what it is that we are taking photos of. I can totally see Bailey running around with a machete cutting arms and shit off! She also has a great ability when it comes to conveying emotions.
Who designed the effects?
This is the third time I teamed up with the great Larry Sampson. He did the effects and production design on the other two shoots as well as this one and does an amazing job! Funny thing is that he was a horror/gore kid growing up. So bloodying up naked chicks wasn't a hard sell. Larry had a whole team working with him this time creating props and weapons. Bailey's sword is actually a pizza cutting knife! I worked with Shannon on costumes for the first time with this set. I wanted to put Bailey in a old "Flo" style waitress uniform(I had a vision of her as a worn out double shift waitress at some middle of nowhere truck stop.) Getting our hands on the right looking outfits was tough, Shannon ended up custom tailoring and dying white nurse uniforms and they looked perfect! Both girls ended up keeping the outfits (you should have seen Bailey walking down the street at 5am in her blood covered costume.) Bailey has put hers up for sale on ebay so if you guys want a piece of the action check it out:
Where did we shoot?
For those of you who know Boston might be able to recognize Herrell's Renaissance Caf in Allston.
Who are the Zombies?
The first thing I had to clear with SG was putting other people in the set. If you are gonna do a shoot about zombies then we need to see what they look like. Casting was as easy as you would think. What would you say if someone asked you "Hey you wanna get dressed up in the coolest Halloween costume ever and tear clothes of a chick?" We had a few cameos. The Mohawk zombie was played by Rick from the band BADASH http://www.myspace.com/badashrocks . He is not a stranger to effects and recently opened for GWAR! If you are a fan of "Starvin' with Louis" then look closely at the final zombies and you might recognize one of them. The fist zombie killed in the jumpsuit was my uncle! He has played a zombie in every one of my horror films. I called him up two days before. I hadn't spoken to him in over a year and the first thing he said was: "You need me to bring back the dead right?". It took me a minute to explain that it was for a photo shoot not a film and when he found out it was for SG he said: "I'll take my heart medicine and we will be all set!"
So what is next?
We have a few ideas kicking around and some SG's that we are very excited to work with. When we start shootingwell soon.
This was also the first SG set that had trailers and teasers made for it. SG made an official one that was released on youtube three days before and has gotten all sorts of best of notes:
I also put one together and got their blessing to release it as well:
High Res for you Image Junkies!
Oh and how many of you spotted the car fire? Look again.
Thanks for watching.
Mike
P.S. Feel free to talk to the other Crew Members on SG:
Production design: droctopus
SG Make-up Artist & Hair: Raedyn
Lighting Tech: dozer138
PA: section8
VIEW 25 of 69 COMMENTS
It was amazingly well shot and lit, I loved the creature effects. The props were great, and whoever put the after effects on/together is really talented.
I've seen a lot of cheesy additions some people put on, not here, it was full on quality comic book gore. The multi shot pages were classic comics and I loved them.
I did see the 'fire glow' in several of the shots, and did notice that whatever was on fire was out the window in the shot where she's looking back and seeing her friend zombie comin for her (off screen) I didn't really look to see it was a car till just now...gives me a good excuse to go view it again