John Q. Phats Entertainment

I’m pretty sure we are done with Do Nice Guys Finish Last.  Not really though.  All I have to do is get the final from Gabe and add the credits.  I think what Gabe has to do is just put everything together.  It’s kind of hard to explain.  Right now, the color correction and transitions are on two different files.  I have no clue how he puts the two together, but apparently it will only take him like 5 minutes.  I’ve already finished the credits. 
The other day I heard that a friend of a friend absolutely hated Do Nice Guys Finish Last.  She thought it was offensive and depicted women as shallow.  I’m not going to lie, that’s a possibility.  I personally thought that the men were depicted just as shallow as the women.  If not more so.  Caine’s character is the absolute epitome of a sex crazed male idiot.  I more thought of it as a “what a stupid world” type of a statement.  Still, I’m always curious what other people think.  The other day someone told me that they liked Censored, but they didn’t consider it a comedy at all.  They considered it a bold statement on how censorship can strip everything human away from us.  How, if you censor us, there’s nothing left.  I thought that was really interesting.  She was absolutely shocked that I didn’t make that statement on purpose.  It was kind of an after thought, but when I sat down to write Censored, I wasn’t thinking that at all.  I told her friend to e-mail me.  I’m really curious what she thinks.  Everyone interprets things differently and I think I should take all those interpretations  in to consideration. 
So, I’ve finally started messing around with Adobe After Effects.  That is possibly the coolest program I’ve ever worked with.  I’m going to throw this link up here again because I absolutely love this web site:
http://www.videocopilot.net/tutorials/
I have no clue why this guy posts all these tutorials for free, but holy hell does this guy know his stuff.  On top of that, he’s great at walking you through step by step and explaining things.  I’ve started doing some work for a guy who does video game videos and I made this intro using one of the tutorials on Video Copilot.  Check it out:
http://www.vimeo.com/7013250
I thought about posting something like that here, but I don’t really think it would fit in the shorts section.

So, there are several web sites that I feel I should mention that are valuable resources to any film maker.  We use all of these quite a bit and I honestly don’t know what I would do without them. 
http://www.bhphotovideo.com
If you do a google search you’ll find cameras and equipment way cheaper then here, but those are all scams.  Before you commit to buying something from a web site that seems too good to be true, go back to google and type in “(Name of web site) Scam”.  You would be surprised at how common these types of scams are.  B & H is well known and I have yet to have a problem with them.  Plus, often times their prices are cheaper then some of the other big names out there.
http://www.lacasting.com/la_home.asp
Easy to use, free registration, plus tons of actors to choose from.  A great place to get actors in the LA area.
http://www.freesound.org  
The Free Sound Project is a community that all just records or creates audio and uploads it to the site for other people to rate and download.  Create a free account and you can search the data base and download all of the royalty free audio that you want.  Only problem is, is that the community is almost too big.  Often times you have to wade through a lot of crap to find what you’re looking for.  Most of the time it’s worth it though.  If you’re looking for a specific sound effect that won’t cost, The Freesound Project is probably your best bet.
http://www.videocopilot.net/tutorials/
For special effects we use Adobe After Effects.  It’s absolutely amazing how many quality tutorials there are on Video Copilot.  All are videos that you view, so just do what you see.  The site is so popular that a lot of the effects are a little overdone.  If you want to learn Adobe After Effects though, Video Copilot is the place.  Literally, he goes over it from beginning to end.  How you should film it and how to apply the effects once you have the footage.  Video Copilot is seriously the best tutorial site I’ve ever visited.  Every tutorial is easy to follow and quality effects.