On November 17th 2012, the cast and crew of Project: Potemkin completed another vignette, "The Shovel of Kahless." Starring Jeffrey Green as Captain Grigory, Bill Mackenzie as Lt. Commander Caley, Renda Carr as Dr. Drake and Richard Thorton as Lt. Frazier. Guest starring William C. Searcy as Corporal Khomar (Ret.), Ashley Longacre as Qem'Bo, Eric Holt and Jeremy Ellenberg as the sons of Khomar. Also starring Jack Zumwalt as Captain Kesh, Robert Ladimer as Voltar, Tom Knighton as Bob Petaki. With Keith Harris as Carter Winston. Directed by Sara Higgins Mackenzie. Hosted by Linda Marcusky and Kim Landers. Produced by Randall Landers. All in all, it was a terrific shoot with the whole cast helping out with the makeup and the production in general. The Klingon cast members were called at 9:00am, and they ended up looking terrific. Check out more pictures on our Facebook group: http://www.facebook.com/groups/projectpotemkin/
Been a busy little weekend here: 1) Updated the main Project: Potemkin site with a News article on "The Shovel of Kahless" http://www.projectpotemkin.com/index.php?id=195 2) Continuing to make repairs to the bridge astrogator. We've replaced the service board with 15/16" plywood. Captain Grigory will be able to prop up his feet on the new panel. LOL 3) Uploading a BUNCH more "Shovel of Kahless" pictures to our Photobucket account: http://s1112.beta.photobucket.com/user/Project_Potemkin/library/ (These were taken mostly by Tim Carr, with William C. Searcy taking many as well.) 4) Contacted Keiichi-K1 at Deviant Art, and obtained his permission to use his helm-navigation panel as well as several of his animated Flash objects on various screens throughout the set. Really looking forward to using them. You can view his artwork page at: http://keiichi-k1.deviantart.com/gallery/2157624 5) We will be shooting two short, bridge-based vignettes ("Command Decision" and "Just Once") on December 21st and 22nd. Both scripts were written by David Eversole. 6) Trying to figure out a good weekend in January to shoot a landing party episode in Little Ocmulgee State Park which is about 100 miles from here. We'll need three cast members for Gorn, and three landing party members. Bear in mind, the Gorn are going to be completely obscured by the lizard masks. 7) Doug Harper is putting together a shoot in the Pittsburgh (PA) area. If you're interested, you can contact him here as USS Jack Riley, on Facebook as G. Douglas Harper, or you can contact me and I'll forward your email directly to him. Hoping everyone ate far less than I did --- no more dressing and gravy for a while for me --- and that you all had a great Thanksgiving!
We're pleased to announce that we'll be filming two vignettes on the weekend of the 21st and 22nd. We've cast local actress Ann Young to play Captain Peggy Spurlock of the USS Athena. Spurlock, who has spent many years as its captain, has often bemoaned the fact that nothing interesting ever happens with the Athena... Additional details and photos to be released after the shoots!
The cast of "Command Decision" and "Just Once" posed for a publicity still during this weekend's shoot of those two vignettes. Back: Bill Mackenzie as Lt. Cmdr. Quinton Caley, Guest Star Ann Young as Fleet Captain Peggy Spurlock, Eric R. Moore as Commander Polim n'Ahman, Stephanie Burke as Lieutenant Sharon M'tume, Ande Ross as Ensign Gordon Avery, Chris Coleman as Lieutenant Drew Wallace. Front: Abby Evans as Lieutenant Tyler Landon, Kim Landers as Lieutenant M'Anna, Jeffrey Green as Captain Alec Grigory, and Dakota Dodge as Ensign Burroughs.
We're pleased to announce that the first trailer from our upcoming episode, "The Night the Stars Fell from the Sky" is now on-line at YouTube: http://youtu.be/rGJgxXUkKH4 Our thanks to Steve Gallant for producing this promo for us!
UPDATE TO ALL EPISODES IN PRODUCTION: First Season S01-G Randy Landers and Rick Foxx are both at work on the VFX for the vignette, "Archway." This production stars Doug Harper, Richard Thornton, Hannah Ruiz and Jeff Green. Directed by Doug Harper. S01-H Mark Brennan and Bob Reed continue to work on the VFX for the vignette, "Devil in the Details." This production stars Mario Pagan, Doug Harper, Eric R. Moore, Richard Thornton, and guest stars Cassie Martin and John Lenwell. Directed by Mario Pagan. S01-2 R.H. Barr is now at work on the VFX for the full length 62min episode "The Night the Stars Fell from the Sky." This production stars Jeff Green, Christin Woods, Bill Mackenzie, Pamela Robinson and Richard Thornton, and guest stars Dennis Proulx, William C. Searcy, Sara Higgins Mackenzie. Also featured: Doug Harper, Eric R. Moore, Eric Holt, James Green. Directed by Jeffrey Green. Second Season S02-A Bill Walker is at work on the VFX for "Duty Bound." This vignette stars Jeffrey Green, Sara Higgins Mackenzie, Doug Harper, Hannah Ruiz, Chris Coleman, Richard Thornton, Kim Landers, and Jason Ryan Wallace. Directed by Bill Mackenzie. S02-B VFX artist Chris Cameron is at work on the rough cut of "Darkness." This vignette stars Chris Coleman, Bill Mackenzie, Christin Woods, Sara Higgins Mackenzie, Stephanie Burke and Pamela Robinson. Directed by Randy Landers. S02-C Rick Foxx has completed a rough cut of "Second Contact."*The VFX for this production will be completed by Kenneth Thomson. The vignette stars Doug Harper, Abby Evans, Jeffrey Green, Dakota Dodge, James Green, Tim Lloyd, and Robert Ladimer. S02-D Randy Landers has completed a rough cut for "Ashes." This vignette features Jeffrey Green, Bill Mackenzie, Sara Higgins Mackenzie and Abby Evans. It was shot in downtown Americus, Georgia. Chris Cameron will be providing the VFX for this episode. S02-E The vignette, "Beach Towel," has been edited by Rick Foxx. VFX by Rick Endres and Chris Cameron have been incorporated into the production which stars Sara Higgins Mackenzie, Keith Harris, Eric Holt, Jeremy Ellenberg, Bill Mackenzie and Pamela Robinson. Directed by Bill Mackenzie. S02-F Sara Higgins Mackenzie directed "The Shovel of Kahless" which features Jeffrey Green, Jack Zumwalt, William Searcy, Eric Holt, Jeremy Ellenberg, Ashley Longacre, Bill Mackenzie, Renda Carr, Richard Thornton and Robert Ladimer. VFX for this vignette will be completed by Kenneth Thompson. Sara Mackenzie and Randall Landers will begin editing this production in the new year. S02-G "Command Decision" is a vignette starring Jeffrey Green, Chris Coleman, Eric R. Moore, Kim Landers, Dakota Dodge, Bill Mackenzie, Abby Evans and Stephanie Burke, and featuring Ande Ross. Recently shot, it's now in the queue to be edited. S02-H The production, "Just Once," is another vignette set aboard the bridge of the Potemkin, and stars Jeffrey Green, Eric R. Moore, Abby Evans, Ande Ross, Chris Coleman, Stephanie Burke, Dakota Dodge, Kim Landers and Bill Mackenzie. Special guest star: Ann Young. This one is also in the queue to be edited. S02-I "The Lucky One," a vignette shot in our digital sickbay, is in the hands of editor Rick Foxx. This episode features Renda Carr as Dr. Maura Drake, Chief Medical Officer of the Potemkin. Editing is expected to begin in the new year. S02-J "Red Sky at Night," a vignette to be shot in January (I hope!) will feature Jeffrey Green as Captain Grigory and William Searcy as an old friend of his from the Academy. Third Season S03-1 The Ft. Gaines' frontier village will be the location for the upcoming episode, "Two Worlds," written by Ray Coleman. This is a 20-30 minute episode. S03-2 The episode "The Monsters Are With Us" by Charles Kelso Bramlett. This is a 20-30 minute episode. This episode will be shot at our brig, transporter and corridor sets at Fast Copy in Albany, Georgia. S03-A The vignette, "Holding Area," by David Eversole, is schedule to be shot in 2013. This 10-minute vignette will star Christin Woods and Jeffrey Green. This production will be shot at a nearby vacation home. S03-3 The episode, "Cassie," featuring Jeffrey Green is scheduled for the upcoming year as well. Delays with this 30-minute production are associated with its location; we want the right locale for this very significant production. Other productions to be announced later!
^^^I see we finally have a suitable title for the T'Noshi/Grigory vignette. Christ, I must have tried on twenty with no success. Thanks. That fits very well. And a note, "The Monsters are With Us" is written by the TrekBBS's very own poster "Kelso." It is one heck of a fine script in the very best traditions of TOS -- a morality play within a detective story framework.
I thought of it on the fly this afternoon as I work to update all our sites by the year's end. I almost went with "Buffering..." but chose a more Human-centric one. Kelso's script is a winner. I actually was sketching this afternoon at Fast Copy. We're building a T-shaped corridor (with at least one turbolift) for "Monsters" and "Red Sky" and a brig set for "Monsters." I may ask Michael Zock for his input on the square space we have available for the brig.
I am blown away. What a plan! And I had just put together a 'guess' list of future episodes for Project Potemkin two days ago, so this is a great blessing. I replaced my guess with your real plan! SUPER!!! Best of luck in EVERYTHING in your life, not only your Trek stuff, in the next year!! Happy New Year!!!
Thanks, Barbara, I appreciate it. We've just been so busy filming the second season vignettes that I hadn't the time to update the websites. I dedicated the entire day to updating the Project: Potemkin page and others on the Orion Press Fan Films page with updated information. So far we've got 7 productions on YouTube and Vimeo and Pauley79. We've got three in the final stages of post production (including "Archway" which I've worked on since dinner). We've got footage for another 9 vignettes already shot and in various stages of completion (mostly because we're working feverishly on the three I mentioned earlier, but especially the 62 min "The Night the Stars Fell from the Sky"). We have one more vignette to film for this season (next month). Then we're starting on a couple of shorts (including one to be shot at TrekTrax Atlanta) and three (count 'em!) full-length episodes for our third season. All the things that we try in the vignettes carry over as learning experiences for our episodes. We're having fun, and telling what we hope are good and entertaining stories. We wish everyone at TrekBBS a Happy New Year, and we look forward to the coming releases for 2013!
What I have been seeing is marked improvement as you go along. That's not unique for fan series, but it's fun to watch. As a relative newcomer to fan film viewing (with no ambition to make my own), it's exciting for me to see the process of a major series as it rolls out, right from the start. HF was almost done when I showed up, Farragut, Intrepid and Phase II were in process, Beyond was complete, and the long-running Teen Trek series, (now film school student series) England's Star Trek Unity, had already grown from being a record of 11 to 14 year olds playing 'pretend' to a real fan series. This is the first MAJOR series I've had the chance to watch from the start. Of course, it's fun to see the one-to four film stories/mini-series, too. I am still looking forward to Archway with enthusiasm! And that CGI from The Night the Stars Fell From the Sky has me drooling! I am just BLOWN AWAY by what I am seeing!
I hope Bill managed to convert the sickbay set to his software format and then add the final touches. With the most recent software updates he should be able to get even better results than the work-in-progress version.
Barbara -- We're all excited about "Night," too. Lennier -- Bill Walker is working on the VFX for "Duty Bound" right now, and they look super. Rick Foxx is editing "The Lucky One" and when he's finished, we'll look at what we need to do and who will need to do it. We're just glad we've got five VFX teams working on our productions. -- Any suggestions for the layout of a brig?
A brig for that era should be relatively simple. I would've simply taken those arches from the TNG brig, made it more narrow (shorten the center beam), added those rods from the ST5 brig (to offer something closer to the movie era) and the rest would simply be a blend of design elements from the TNG brig and the ST6 redress of the transporter room. Actual use: Just render the brig as a background plate, then lay the actor green screen layer on top of that and a layer with just the horizontal bars on top of those two. The glow for those bars can then be done in post production. This way you'd end up with something that feels familiar, yet different and still would only have to invest minimal effort. Wouldn't even feel that much out-of-place because the changed layout would reflect the jailbreak in Final Frontier and since TNG inherited a lot of the movie sets you can usually get away with a lot of common elements.
Let me give that some thought. I really hadn't thought of green screening it, but I'm game. The bars were going to be in AfterEffects, I admit. Still working on the "Archway" vignette this week in the evenings, but I'll work up some ideas this weekend.
It's a throwaway set that will only be used on rare occasions. Unless you plan to throw a lot of people in jail it probably won't pay off to redress an actual room.
This is looking great. I can't wait to see it! Heh. I'm not sure that is going to be a selling point for anyone... but I appreciate the kind words.
I could be tempted. My next construction project is a corridor, and the brig is right off of it. I may decide to put a two-sided brig in and redress it as needed for an exam room or crew quarters or whatever else is needed as dictated by the script. Honestly, I never build anything unless I'm going to use it. Kelso's excellent script calls for the brig, the exam room, and even can make use of the corridors. The corridors also make an appearance in our next vignette, "Red Sky at Night."