Brenda
SF Classiques 019
14/03/10 15:39 Filed in: High School
SF Ephemera - Part 2
Let's go over some of the groups our team gravitated to in high school.
When we last met electronically, I mentioned the word "Semanon". While it sounds like a cult of some kind, it was just the backstage crew for the high school theater. The school made the mistake of buying very high end equipment for the new auditorium, and it quickly became clear that you needed trained people to run it. That meant that a normal method of a sign-up sheet for backstage crew just didn't work.
So, a regular student crew was trained to run all the stage productions, and the name "Semanon" (no names backwards) was adopted for them. Saylor, Bill, Mike, Steve, and myself were in Semanon at various times. Since we were essentially indispensable (a last minute walkout once threatened to cancel the school musical), we got away with a lot more than we should have.
Also, there were the "Hi-Lo's", also known as show choir. If it sounds geeky--don't worry, it is. I was the lone male SF member who got into the group, but most of the female contingent (Lynda, Beth, Sharon) were in it as well. Saylor and Brenda were in the less geeky A'capella Choir.
There was also a large contingent in the high school band. If I remember correctly: Mike, Brenda, Sharon, and Lynda were in the marching band, and Lynda was the drum major, if that's the correct term.
Finally, to maximize our geek quotient: Eric was the valedictorian of our graduating class, Mike was the salutatorian, Bill was the president of the Science Club, and I was the president of the Science Fiction club.
As I've said before, I'm sure I'm remembering some of this incorrectly. Blame it on my ancient neurons misfiring.
Meanwhile--let's listen to some more bits from Outstanding in Our Field....
SF Classiques 016
23/01/10 19:16 Filed in: Star Trek
A Brief (?) History of SF Productions - Part 16
We now move into the late 80's, and a bit of a hiatus for SF as people went off into the world to get actual jobs, get married, get more degrees (I'm looking at you, Beth), etc. In 1988, Mike and I created a 10th anniversary set (just a set of clips, kind of like what I'm doing here) and the "Is It Love" dance remix played in episode one. This took quite a lot of work since Eric was unavailable, so we sampled his voice track line by line to match the new tempo. Eric was quite surprised to later hear his voice on something he wasn't directly involved in.
We made another attempt in 1989 to do something quasi-professional. We had gone to the well of Star Trek several times, and the Next Generation series was on the air. I made the call that we needed an actual script, and got it into my mind to hold a "writing retreat" away from distractions such as television (and as it later turned out, hygiene). My father had a cabin out in the boondocks which sounded good when he described it, but was quite a mess when I got to actually see it. I made my best attempt to clean things up, but the team wasn't particularly impressed when they opened the door. However, we made the best of it, and with a borrowed laptop, Steve, Mike, Bill, Janet, Brenda, Saylor and I cranked out our Next Gen script.
It took us another year to actually tape the thing in September of 1990. It's probably the slickest thing we ever did. We really concentrated on appropriate background music and special effects. Keep in mind this was in the pre-digital days; each effect was sampled into a synthesizer and recorded in real time on a multi-track tape recorder. It would be a cinch to do it today in Garageband. However, I always felt it lacked spontaneity--that's the downside of a script, I suppose.
So, let's take a listen. Next time I will wrap up this brief (?) history lesson.
We now move into the late 80's, and a bit of a hiatus for SF as people went off into the world to get actual jobs, get married, get more degrees (I'm looking at you, Beth), etc. In 1988, Mike and I created a 10th anniversary set (just a set of clips, kind of like what I'm doing here) and the "Is It Love" dance remix played in episode one. This took quite a lot of work since Eric was unavailable, so we sampled his voice track line by line to match the new tempo. Eric was quite surprised to later hear his voice on something he wasn't directly involved in.
We made another attempt in 1989 to do something quasi-professional. We had gone to the well of Star Trek several times, and the Next Generation series was on the air. I made the call that we needed an actual script, and got it into my mind to hold a "writing retreat" away from distractions such as television (and as it later turned out, hygiene). My father had a cabin out in the boondocks which sounded good when he described it, but was quite a mess when I got to actually see it. I made my best attempt to clean things up, but the team wasn't particularly impressed when they opened the door. However, we made the best of it, and with a borrowed laptop, Steve, Mike, Bill, Janet, Brenda, Saylor and I cranked out our Next Gen script.
It took us another year to actually tape the thing in September of 1990. It's probably the slickest thing we ever did. We really concentrated on appropriate background music and special effects. Keep in mind this was in the pre-digital days; each effect was sampled into a synthesizer and recorded in real time on a multi-track tape recorder. It would be a cinch to do it today in Garageband. However, I always felt it lacked spontaneity--that's the downside of a script, I suppose.
So, let's take a listen. Next time I will wrap up this brief (?) history lesson.
SF Classiques 014
A Brief (?) History of SF Productions - Part 14
We now move into 1984. This was the year of the Los Angeles Summer Olympics, so I decided our major goal for the year was a video parody of the games. Mike was involved in electronic music classes in college, so we used that as an excuse to create a new theme for the games. We spent a concentrated period of a few days in the summer (remember, we still had to rent video equipment) and shot all over town.
We used a local monument that had a number of steps to stand in for the stairs leading up to the Olympic flame. Of course, we couldn't have an actual flame involved, so for some reason, we stuck a roll of toilet paper on a stick. Sharon ran up the steps, and I followed her with the camera, interviewing her as she ran--it's amazing that anything was kept in the frame. A quick cut to Lynda's backyard and the grill stood in for the actual lighting of the flame. We were still using the toilet paper, so small pieces of flaming paper started flying around--for a moment, there was a real possibility we were going to burn down her house!
We shot Saylor riding a bike on a grassy hill (anybody can ride on cement), we created a set of sport logos with Brenda in a black suit performing each sport, and we created animated network logo in Mike's basement with styrofoam, a model train set, a vacuum cleaner, and some black wire. We shot commercials for the Kmart Financial Network, and bits on souvenirs and the Olympic breakdancing competition in Mike's backyard with Mike's brother Dan.
Dan also was one of the stars of the centerpiece event--cross country golf. The idea was that you had to hit a ball from one golf course through the town to another golf course. Brenda, Dan, Saylor, and Sharon were the competitors, and Mike and I did color commentary. Sharon's character was hit with a ball at the very start of the competition, and Brenda's character was apparently kidnapped, leaving Saylor and Dan. We shot footage all over town, ending up at the other golf course in town. Saylor did the "agony of defeat" bit, and Dan was victorious.
Finally, we shot some footage at the NBS Olympic headquarters (Lynda's basement), which should have been enough to let me to put together something coherent. I haven't actually gotten around to finishing the edit--I suppose I should get to that, being 25 year later...
In 1985, we went back to audio, since Star Trek III came out that year. We brought Eric's Spock back from the dead with help from Saylor, Sharon, Mike, Bill, Brenda, Steve, and Janet--wait a minute, who's Janet?? You'll find out next time, as the marriage bug infects SF, and we become Outstanding. Meanwhile, I think there's a Vulcan to search for...
SF Classiques 012
A Brief (?) History of SF Productions--Part 12
SF finished 1982 with another political special (Confusion '82), and by this point we apparently decided that Reagan had won the 1980 race, since we spent some time either praising or bashing him. There were some small pre-written bits, which became painfully obvious as the production went on. We ended up spending half the tape doing commercial parodies--Eric, Bill, Steve, Lynda, Mike, Beth, and new member Brenda Bader (Badger) joined in the fun. Brenda lived just two blocks away from me, so I had known her since elementary school. She eventually became the SF Historian--in fact, for this blog, I have been referencing a book she put together for my wedding documenting SF's history. She was involved with SF for several years, but I haven't heard from her for awhile (if you read this Brenda, please e-mail me through the site or find me via FaceBook!).
1983 was known as the "Summer of SF"--we got back together after a year in college, and spent every minute of that summer together. There's enough for two entries here, so let's start with "Return of the Jedi Glasses". Lucas & Co. had the promotional machine going full blast by the time "Episode VI" came out, so we spent much of this production talking about the various tie-ins than the actual storyline. "Jedi Glasses", of course, referred to the Burger King promotional item. Eric, Steve, Mike, Saylor, Sharon, and Brenda came together for our 30th tape.
We also ventured into video for the first time, doing a parody of the sci-fi show "V" (which oddly enough just got a remake) called "Y". We taped it in my basement with zero production values (the ship looked cool, though, thanks Mike), using a rented camcorder, so we had to do it quickly. Eric managed to cut himself on the head by jumping into a ceiling beam, but we persevered and got it done. Unfortunately, this tape disappeared years ago (I do have a beta videotape labelled "Y", but I have no way to play it). Perhaps I'll pull a Jackie Gleason years from now and release it as the "lost production".
This was also the year we got official pictures taken (the pic on this site's homepage came from 1983). The blue golf shirts we're wearing had an SF logo which was laboriously added via a silkscreen device Mike had, and rapidly fell apart since they were really cheap.
Okay, there's more of 1983 to come, but for now, let's go to a galaxy far, far, away...