Marooned

burttheskull@gmail.com (Ryan Earls and Michael Wright) — Tue, 20 Jul 2010 04:22:00 +0000

Work for the short is slow, but still underway. The bulk of the "filming" is done, just gotta do the editing and what not. Then I've gotta do some writing for the latter portion of the video, which will require more musicality than normal, which just happens to be my specialty. Stay tuned for more ... stuff.

-PLAYLIST-

Norma Jean - Meridional

Haste the Day - Attack of the Wolf King

Deftones - Diamond Eyes

Oceana - Clean Head

burttheskull@gmail.com (Ryan Earls and Michael Wright) — Wed, 30 Jun 2010 00:22:00 +0000

So clearly, the whole weekly post thing didn't work out. There's a bit of news, though, so I'll post that. We were really bored one day, and wrote and recorded (audio) a short. If there is one way to describe it, it would be: ridiculous. Whether that's good or bad is up to you. There's still work to be done on it, so it may be another month before it surfaces. Hopefully it's still current by then, but we're putting it out regardless.

ARE YOU KIDDING ME?!?!

burttheskull@gmail.com (Ryan Earls and Michael Wright) — Thu, 27 May 2010 10:49:00 +0000

So I just got off work, and I'm exhausted, but I'm posting this nonetheless. Forgive any stupid errors I might make in the process. While this has nothing to do with marooned, I'm still pissed about it and am going to complain. In regards to the series finale of Lost. Really? That's how you're going to end it? Could you have thought of a worse way to end it? I think the smoke monster killing everyone would've been preferable. Everything was on the right track until the last 15 minutes, and now you've gone and ruined Lost for me completely. All the mystery, all the coolness, gone. Of all the things, the flash sideways had to be freaking purgatory b.s.? You've got to be kidding me. All this time I had confidence that the writers could pull it off. But really? This is how you end it? No answers? Or what about the fact that half of your main characters get sent back to the 70's, and you don't even do anything with it? Seriously? Or the other half that got nose bleeds from hopping around time, what was the point of that? So you sent Locke back to the states where he gets strangled by Ben. You could've come up with a simpler way to do that. Don't get me wrong, I liked the time travel, but you didn't do anything with it. It turned out to be a waste. And why did you make Jacob just a regular human? You should've left him as some sort of deity of some sort like you originally lead us to believe. And why didn't you kill Kate? Kate is a stupid whore, you should've killed her. And why do all these murderers get to go to heaven at the end? How many people did Sayid, Gin, Kate, Claire and all the other people murder? Is there no punishment for wrong doing, every one gets to heaven and is rewarded for all the good deeds we didn't do? And why are you trying to force your Hollywood version of religion down our throats? It's like those stupid coexist stickers, that if these people had any idea of what Islam or Christianity actually was, then they would understand why those things don't work. I'm not trying to force my beliefs down anyones throats, I'm just frustrated with the fact that Hollywood thinks it can. BS if there ever was any. One day, I'll get over this. But that day is not today.

Look at me, I'm loling!

burttheskull@gmail.com (Ryan Earls and Michael Wright) — Thu, 20 May 2010 22:39:00 +0000

Video of the day

EDIT: TITLE

burttheskull@gmail.com (Ryan Earls and Michael Wright) — Wed, 28 Apr 2010 04:41:00 +0000

Well, my sister tells me that if I blog consistently, then somehow people will pay attention. I have my doubts, but it is a new week, and I feel like it, so here you go. Started some of the audio editing, and I have a picture. That must make me super cool. As you can probably tell from the picture, the editing is in the earliest stage, which is even more early due to the fact that Ryan's lines have yet to be recorded, as well as some Galactica lines (since I can do those any time).

PICTURE!

EDIT:

And, just for the heck of it,

PICTURE 2!

EDIT 2:

I've come across a few new bands, one in particular I really like, as well as some I've discovered in the last few months. So you get a playlist today.

-PLAYLIST-

Architects - "Hollow Crown" (stoked to finally find another good metal band)

War of Ages - "Arise and Conquer"

mewithoutYou - "Brother, Sister", "Catch for Us the Foxes", "A to B Life"

He is Legend - "It Hates You"

OIU(#$R Y(#YR )(W*RU#)DFO:HET

burttheskull@gmail.com (Ryan Earls and Michael Wright) — Sat, 24 Apr 2010 09:12:00 +0000

So a week or so ago, we got some voices down for the first 3 episodes, except for some Doonbar\K'nuski lines (and a few scenes where it was just exclusively Ryan's characters and 1 other character). It's the most progress we've made in a while, and it's been well over a year since we've had to do any voices. It was hard for pretty much all of us to remember our characters, but we got it in the end. While writing screenplays and doing voices is fun, I have little doubt that this will be the last type of this thing we end up doing this extensively, and especially the last machinima. Although it's nice to release episodes every week, this time around, plan on having each one released when it's done, otherwise you'd have to wait a while to see anything. We're not dead yet. Life always gets crazy, and it'll only get crazier from here.

Also, I don't have a time frame for releasing the full season thing. All I can say is it'll be done when it's done (the most reviled of answers, I know). I'm still sifting through them and trying to make everything flow a little bit better.

Titles Are for Lame-os

burttheskull@gmail.com (Ryan Earls and Michael Wright) — Sat, 16 Jan 2010 01:31:00 +0000

Wow, October was the last time I posted. Man, that was a long time ago.

Well, we actually sat down the other day and went over some stuff (Ryan's been busy and never had a chance to read over all the newly written stuff, so he did that). We came up with a few ideas, which'll be cool, but mostly just decided we like what we've got for ... the final episodes! We will be doing season 2, though it won't be as extensive as we originally had planned. If we stuck to that, it would've ended up being way too long, and we're having a hard enough time right now with just one episode. So we scrapped that, took from it what we could, and wrote 5 more episodes, making a total of 7 (episode 12 was rewritten and split into 2 episodes, maybe 3 if we can find a way to make it work). So it's not super long, but then again the first half of season 1 nothing happened. It's way faster paced and the episodes will be more focused, meaning not nearly as much filler time and more meat. It's all pretty rough right now, but the basic integrity is there in full. We want to get back in the swing of things, it's been tough with Ryan having a couple kids and me getting my music ready to send out to some record labels, but we'll get it done sooner or later. In the mean time, stay tuned. I have been working on refining the earlier episodes, so as to hopefully put them together into a single, seamless video as some have requested, but if people want, I can also release the modified ones individually, since I think they'll be more interesting to watch than before. Check our channel on Vimeo for episode 1, it should be up there soon, and that'll give you an idea of what I mean.

BELIEVE?!?!?!?!?!?!

burttheskull@gmail.com (Ryan Earls and Michael Wright) — Thu, 22 Oct 2009 03:25:00 +0000

Believe it or not, we have been working on stuff. It's taking its time, but it'll get there eventually. It's all in the pre-production stages right now, which is largely due to time constraints (since the co-creator, Ryan, actually has a life and his own family to support). In the mean time, I've been bored, so I've been going through the original episodes and tightening things up, making them flow smoother and less "nothing time." We'll let you guys know what's up once we're comfortable with where we're at. In the mean time, stay tuned.

Tinsy winsy

burttheskull@gmail.com (Ryan Earls and Michael Wright) — Mon, 31 Aug 2009 05:04:00 +0000

It's a small update, but an update nonetheless. So, as most of you have noticed, it's been a while since we've released anything. The original plan was to have episode 12 as the season finally, but--and this is just our reclassification of something that just happened that way--we've basically just decided 11 was the finally. We are working on season 2 as we speak, and will do an "official" (i.e. more detailed) announcement of it once we've finished this last chunk of writing.

So, to sum up: this is a small update, 11 inadvertently became the season finally so we're going with it, and we're announcing that we're going to announce something soon.

And if anyone's interested, I have a new song up over here.

-PLAYLIST-

Oh, Sleeper - "Son of the Morning"
Thrice - "Beggars"
Oceana - "Birtheater"

The Rewrite

burttheskull@gmail.com (Ryan Earls and Michael Wright) — Tue, 11 Aug 2009 22:18:00 +0000

So the rewrite of Episode 12 has actually been done for some time now, but somehow I forgot to post it up here. Somehow, in my plans to condense everything, it grew 8 pages, making it a whopping 22 pages (in screen plays, it's assumed that each page is a minute, but we don't really do things by-the-book, so it could either be longer or shorter). It's possible to split it up into 2 episodes, which we've discussed, but have leaned against it a bit. We'll see, though. I think Ryan has the day off tomorrow, so we'll see if we can get some stuff done.

In other news, Thrice has a new album out today, and it's amazing. I recommend everyone check it out.

-PLAYLIST-

Thrice - Beggars
Oceana - Birtheater
Underoath - Lost in the Sound of Separation
The Devil Wears Prada - With Roots Above and Branches Below

We're Not Dead!

burttheskull@gmail.com (Ryan Earls and Michael Wright) — Fri, 24 Jul 2009 05:12:00 +0000

Just a small update to let you know we're still alive. We're working on some stuff that we'll announce once we've figured out exactly what we're going to do. We'll let you guys know as soon as we do.

Time Delay

burttheskull@gmail.com (Ryan Earls and Michael Wright) — Sat, 13 Jun 2009 09:41:00 +0000

So it's been a while. There's not much, but I figured I'd post something anyway (though at this point, I'd be surprised if anyone reads this thing anymore). In the down time, we watch through episodes 1-11 in one sitting, and decided there were some common things about it that bothered us. So, in light of that, we're rewriting Episode 12. In essence, it'll probably be mostly the same, but it needs to be tightened up a bit. The dialogue gets a bit chaotic at some points, and some of it is just unnecessary. All in all, the plan is to vastly improve upon the episode and make the wait that much more worth the while. We have no idea when this thing's going to get done, but it'll definitely help that Phil (Shepard) will be home from his Marine stuff pretty soon, giving us an extra hand at things. That's about it.

12 and Starting Over

burttheskull@gmail.com (Ryan Earls and Michael Wright) — Sun, 22 Mar 2009 08:32:00 +0000

Ok, so I'll be honest with you right off the bat. At this point. we've made little to no progress on filming episode 12, which is largely due to conflicting schedules, other things taking priority, and the fact that there's some scenes with a lot of people in them, which is only amplified by problem number 1. BUT the good news is that the story outline for season 2 is coming along quite well, all of a sudden. There's going to be 2 parts for a large portion of it, similar to the first six episodes of season 1, though much more separation between the two. We got stuck on the first storyline, and so moved onto the second, and got most of the way through it. Somehow I figured out a large portion of the first storyline just now, so I'd say that part is about 75% done. Granted, we still have to actually write all the episodes, but still. Anyway, that's it for now. Our plan is to get the filming out of the way sometime in the next two weeks (spring break), and if all goes well, things should get done rather quickly after that. Then, it'll be a huge break before season 2 (I'd bet on fall, but I don't really know what I'm talking about). Peace.

Looking For Help

burttheskull@gmail.com (Ryan Earls and Michael Wright) — Fri, 06 Mar 2009 06:50:00 +0000

So it's become apparent that Marooned has slowly drifted off of my list of things I have time for, and it's only going to become more so. We've decided that we need to bring on some outside help in order to keep the show running, (i.e. people to take over all the editing and filming); we'll still do all the writing and voicing, but that's about all we'll be able to do. If anyone is interested, e-mail us at BurtTheSkull@Gmail.com for more details. Obviously, we can't pay you because we don't have any money (I'm a freaking musician; musicians don't have money!), but hopefully that's a given. Peace!

Maniacle Exhibition

burttheskull@gmail.com (Ryan Earls and Michael Wright) — Sat, 14 Feb 2009 11:09:00 +0000

So it's been a while since I've updated, or really done anything at all as far as Marooned goes. I wrote a new beginning to the episode, and have messed a little with getting that ready for filming. Most of my recent time has been put into prepping songs, i.e. re-recording and relearning some of them (when you've got several dozen songs and don't do a lot with them after finish them, it's pretty easy to forget large portions of them), I've also got this cool little program called Power Tab that let's you tab out the song as well as write out the notation, which will be good for both remembering how to play it (since I can just look at it) and teaching other people how to play them. It's cool, though it's kinda dumb sometimes, but it's free so I can't really complain.

Filming hasn't really been done at all because most of the scenes will require multiple Xboxes, with the exception of a couple. It's the last episode of the season, meaning after this, there will be an official break before you see any new episodes (if I had to guess, I'd say season 2 will start no earlier than September). Once we complete our musical entourage, I plan to go full force into that, so hopefully I'll still be able to find some time for Marooned. I would imagine so, but I can't say at this point. Anyway, this is basically just putting something up for the sake of putting something up. I'll have more time to work on stuff end of March, when I'm laid off and have no job, so hopefully this won't take 3 months to finish, but I can't make any promises.

Gah!

burttheskull@gmail.com (Ryan Earls and Michael Wright) — Sat, 24 Jan 2009 10:34:00 +0000

So close! So stinking close! I really wanted to get the whole scoring thing for the battle scene done today, but alas it has yet to be completed. It's close, though. Of course, even after I've completed the core melody\rhythm and such, there's going to be some fine tuning that I might need a bit of help on (ie making it full; I don't have a complete grasp on how some of the instruments are used, mainly the mid-ranged ones). There's about a minute left of scoring of the battle itself, then 30 seconds to a minute of, for lack of a better word, the aftermath. It's not an aftermath at all, but I can't say anything without giving things away, so it's an aftermath. Tyson still has his part to do (and Schmidty, if you're reading this, remember how I put it on your flash drive and all, and how you were going to give it to him next time you were over there? Even if he's not there, you can always give it to Andy or Andrew to give to him just in case). 3 weeks still stands even though we're so close, just because that gives us time in case of those "are you kidding me?" moments. That's it for now. Hopefully, this will be my last update before 11 is released. Hopefully.

Soooooon

burttheskull@gmail.com (Ryan Earls and Michael Wright) — Wed, 21 Jan 2009 04:16:00 +0000

It's still "soon" and not "now" at the moment, but we're this close (imagine my fingers being really close together) to that moment! All of the editing should be done at this point. We're gonna have another look at it soon just to make sure. The only thing that isn't finished now is the music. I've got some software on the way that will make that doable, which will hopefully be here within the week, and then Tyson just has to finish his little part, and we're done! Contrary to what I may have said earlier, this episode is going to be longer than I had originally anticipated. My original estimate was 15 minutes, but Episode 11 has reached 20:46, which is practically a half-hour episode with the commercials taken out. Freaking long, that's all I have to say. Unlike our other longer episodes, however, a lot happens in this one. I'd be surprised if anyone was disappointed with this one. Just one more after this and we're home free, until season 2 starts up, which we've already sat down and figured out a basic outline for about half of it. We really want to get everything done for season 2 before we start releasing episodes, that way we don't have 3 month periods without episodes. Anyway, that's about ... it. I'm gonna say 3 weeks, which is a bit longer than I think it's gonna take, but I've been wrong almost every time before, so maybe if I over estimate then I'll actually be right. :-)

Doooo

burttheskull@gmail.com (Ryan Earls and Michael Wright) — Mon, 12 Jan 2009 09:55:00 +0000

All is quiet, but going well, over here at the studio (my room). We've pretty much decided that, except for the battle scene and the soundtrack for one scene that Tyson is doing, the episode's done. And as far as the battle scene goes, I might actually have all the footage I need. I'm not completely sure yet, though. I haven't done any editing for the bs (battle scene) yet, but I'll capture what I just cut up, and then we'll see. The only thing that concerns me is a couple of the characters in it don't really have very many interesting moments, which may or may not matter because the focus is around one character in particular.

One thing I've learned is that filming via X-box Live is not the best idea. Halo 3's recordings are a little too accurate, ie every movement was captured as it was from my computer, lag included, meaning some of the vehicles have a tendency to warp around a lot. It's not a huge deal, since the shots are mostly going to be quick moving shots that switch around a lot. We'll see. Either way, we're hoping to have it all done by the end of the month. No promises, though, because I am going to school full time right now, meaning home work will detract from the time I would normally have to spend editing. Anyway, that's that.

-PLAYLIST-

Lower Definition - The Greatest of All Lost Arts
Paramore - Riot
Radiohead - Kid A
As I Lay Dying - An Ocean Between Us
Austrian Death Machine - Total Brutal

Hopeful Fingers Cross Not

burttheskull@gmail.com (Ryan Earls and Michael Wright) — Fri, 02 Jan 2009 22:30:00 +0000

So, in hope and theory, we have everything filmed. I've got about 45 minutes of battle-scene footage to sift through, which I'm not really looking forward to doing, but there's a heckuvalot of it, which is good because it should ensure that there isn't anything left to film. Actually, I take that back. There is one thing we need filmed, which will be pretty much cake, but it hasn't been filmed yet. But we are seeing the light at the end of the tunnel. We'll keep you posted.

Status Quo

burttheskull@gmail.com (Ryan Earls and Michael Wright) — Tue, 23 Dec 2008 01:21:00 +0000

Progress on episode is, finally, going very well. Aside from a few minor shots, potentially redoing a short scene, and the "battle scene" (which, if you didn't know, we still need some people to volunteer to help us out over X-Box Live, our gamer tags Burn the Shire (Ryan) and The Revengerer (me); just let us know that you want to help out with Marooned), the bulk of the filming is done. 11 is probably not going to be as long as I originally thought it was going to be, but it will either be tied with 9 or just a little bit longer (it's at 11:21 with a few missing shots and without the battle scene, which will be between 1 and 3 minutes), meaning it'll have to be split up into 2 parts again. I was going to post some videos about some weird glitches in Halo 3 (there's a few too many), but at the moment don't really have any way of doing that. We might do a video blog someday or something, though it's really unimportant. That's about it. Everyone have a good Christmas (and for the record, Santa Clause and all his reindeer were not there when Jesus was born, so in reality, they have nothing to do with Christmas).

Hi

burttheskull@gmail.com (Ryan Earls and Michael Wright) — Thu, 11 Dec 2008 10:04:00 +0000

Again, I'm going to apologize for the wait. I'm trying to properly balance my different projects. Sadly, this one has taken the back seat a couple times. My other project, The Restitution, consists of two parts right now: record a CD, and get a band together. Once the preparation stage is over in polishing the songs that will be going on the album (and finishing the two that aren't done yet), I'll have more time to devote to editing and such. Until then, I'll have to wrestle between the two.

I'm still working on editing, though, so don't think I've completely neglected it. We still have a couple scenes to film, so even when I'm done here, there's a bit more work to be done. I'm almost done getting together what's filmed, so there is some progress being made. Other than that, there really isn't anything at this point. So ... I'll leave you with that.

-PLAYLIST-

Thursday - A City by the Light Divided
Copeland - You are My Sunshine
August Burns Red - Messenger
Deftones

Remix the mix!

burttheskull@gmail.com (Ryan Earls and Michael Wright) — Mon, 08 Dec 2008 10:13:00 +0000

In a somewhat trifle observation, I realized I didn't like the mix of our little intro jingle. So, I decided to literally remix it. Now, I'm not talking about your typical "remix," which isn't as much a remix as a complete alteration of the song (usually going from pop rock to techno or electro or whatever the heck you call it). But since the original recording was made probably around 8 months ago or so, I've learned a bit in guitar micing techniques, not that I re-recorded, but I just cut out some unnecessary noise; I also compressed the kick drum and snare a little, make it sound a little bit more even. The guitars, sadly, don't sound quite as good as in any of my recent projects, one of which you'll be hearing as soon as it's done, a little surprise for everyone. Maybe you'll care, maybe you won't. Anyway, that's my blurb for the day. Still patching together 11. Most of it's ready to be captured and edited, though there're still 2 scenes in need of filming (one of which we can actually do over Xbox Live, so if anyone's interested in helping, let us know via Myspace\You Tube).

The Aftermath of the Beginning (aka the in-between)

burttheskull@gmail.com (Ryan Earls and Michael Wright) — Fri, 05 Dec 2008 06:24:00 +0000

So I've begun editing, officially. Usually, I wait till we have all the, for lack of a better word, filming done before I start capturing and editing, but given the circumstances, it's time for a change (not that it wasn't before, it's just that we're trying to speed this up as much as possible). We've actually got the majority of the filming done. There's two scenes left, the very first, and then the very last. We opted to make an addition, which will be the new beginning of this episode. I'm also considering (just for this episode) doing away with the normal intro and making an orchestral version for the soundtrack of the beginning scene. I may or may not. We'll see. Hopefully, this thing will be out sooner rather than later, but only time will tell.

New Beginnings

burttheskull@gmail.com (Ryan Earls and Michael Wright) — Sun, 30 Nov 2008 11:01:00 +0000

So, as with everything (with the exception of God), this episode starts with the beginning. I've got the first 2 or 3 minutes mostly edited together, with a few rough spots. We're off to a good start, and now that my 14 hour Black Friday shift is done with, I'm good. For once, I might actually have a place to incorporate a snippet from one of my real songs in an episode. I think it'll work, though I'll have to get a second opinion from Ryan. I can always modify the part just for this episode. Either way, it's gonna be a cool song (and my first song to have anything resembling a keyboard\piano part, so it's somewhat of an accomplishment for me). Other than that, there's not much to report.

Be sure to check out the the new episode of Matchmaking. Good stuff there. One of very few machinimas I actually like. And they had my favorite part from the last season in there (the killer jeep episode!).

And yes, I know the title for this blog entry thing is pretty much the same as my last one, but I don't care.

-PLAYLIST-
Lower Definition - The Greatest of All Lost Arts
Hopes Die Last - Your Face Down Now EP
Oceana - The Tide
Underoath - Lost in the Sound of Separation\Define the Great Line
August Burns Red "Carol of the Bells" cover

It's begun ... again

burttheskull@gmail.com (Ryan Earls and Michael Wright) — Fri, 21 Nov 2008 07:35:00 +0000

So ... it's been a while since I posted on here. Which is really because there hasn't been anything to say as far as progress goes. As of last night, we finally started filming for episode 11. And no, it's not because we're slackers, just a lot of schedule conflicts and what not. Finding time for 4 people to film has proven more difficult since one of us was shipped off to boot camp until April. Other than that, there really isn't anything exciting going on as of yet. We're stoked to get these last 2 episodes out to you guys, but time is a more complicated factor than we would like. With work picking up by the end of next week, I'm really not sure how much that's going to affect progress, particularly finding time to edit and capture. But it seems only time will tell at this point. As a side note, I finally beat Dead Space. It kept getting pushed aside for other games, but now I'm done with it. Took me over a month (19 hours 30 minutes, but from the day I started it to the day I finished it). Anyway, that's all as far as that all goes.