Janet
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 015
A Brief (?) History of SF Productions - Part 15
During college breaks, I would try to visit SF members at their schools. Bill was attending University of Cincinnati, and I went to see him a few times. He was hanging around with a girl named Janet, and they were becoming quite the couple.
One night, Bill and I were driving around, and he said "how do you feel about an SF wedding?". After discussing logistics of such an event, I gave him my "blessing" as SF President. Thus the SF weddings began. Janet and Bill have been together since then, moving around the country for work, and have ended back up in Ohio, so we can see them often.
The introduction of the Walkman (yep, I'm really old) with recording capabilities let us do some "On the Road" shows. Episode Two's offering is from our first foray into the real world, but we also went to an "international fair" at the mall, two local museums, and an indoor soccer game, ending up in Washington DC with Steve. On that trip, I picked a good place in the Smithsonian where the SF tapes will eventually go, right next to Archie Bunker's chair. I'll play some more of these shows soon.
Meanwhile, I was looking at the end of college, and wondering if we could actually do something with SF that would make money. We began coming up with ideas for what would eventually became "Outstanding in Our Field". We wrote ideas on Post-it notes and put them on the wall in Mike's basement, as that had become our HQ due to all the recording equipment and synthesizers. Mike and Eric put together a few songs, and over the summer we came up with enough ideas and committed them to tape, with the final session over the Labor Day weekend. We found a place that would make up tape duplicates for us, and we went around to radio stations and record stores to try to sell them. We found a new places willing to take a few copies, but it didn't go far. Boy, would this have been easier in the Internet era--just dump them in iTunes! I still have a few copies of the tape in shrinkwrap.
1986 ended with a dinner at Chi-Chi's (remember them?), giving Eric a chance to put in our name as the "Nahtzee" ("Nahtzee party of 10...Nahtzee party...". This was the last time the entire group was together at one time--from then on, there were always one or two people unavailable or out of the country.
Next, a hiatus, then we try to be real writers. Meanwhile, here's some Outstanding bits...
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...