Work proceeds on cleaning up and restoring TWILIGHT OF THE DOGS. Right now it is looking like late May for release on BluRay and DVD. More details soon! And now this:
Going through boxes in storage I came across a film can that I had totally forgotten about. Paul Foster at CinesSolutions scanned the 35mm negative for me to HD and I was pleasantly surprised...I had never seen this footage from my film before! It was never printed, only looked at by Colorlab's color-timer.
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| Liz Heyd |
Bill Dempsey shot them with his 35mm Mitchell BNC (blimp removed), a total of 33 seconds of silliness mostly, of me, star & screenwriter of TOTD Tim Sullivan and my assistant Liz Heyd. Liz was the best at remaining composed...at least on the first take (pictured).
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| Tim Sullivan |
Tim moved even less, mostly raising his eyebrows...and I just mugged. It's pretty amusing, and I'm saving it for the documentary. Man I love the quality of 35mm negative!
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| John Ellis |
Bill Dempsey wrote, "Before we were in that studio space, it was rented out by a guy who ran a specialized photo darkroom. He stopped by one day many years ago and we spoke. It was fascinating. Turns out, my old studio location was the site where this guy actually ran a top secret photo lab for the CIA. According to him, the film from spy planes was developed in there and enlarged on a massive horizontal enlarger he built. He said my camera track resembled the device he once had. I was told it had a very special lens that allowed him to enlarge the secret negatives from the U2 to massive scales. The Cuban Missile crisis negatives were processed and enlarged in my old space according to him. The original owner of the building was also former military man, so I guess that’s how the guy may have ended up there. Interesting trivia."
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| Bill Dempsey in his Arlington Virginia VFX studio when we were working on a film FIRST ENCOUNTER in 1996. That's his camera track described in his comment above! |
So about two thirds of the visual effects for TWILIGHT OF THE DOGS TOTD) were shot in the same space as where the Cuban Missile Crisis and U2 spy plane pictures were processed and printed! How cool is that?
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I've had a problem for a while, that I need to get a bunch of 3/4" UMatic tapes digitized, and local companies want way too much to do it. I'd do it myself BUT both of my decks are DOA. Those decks are getting to be very rare now, but back in the 70's they were the mainstay of local TV stations.But once again my longtime friend Tim Pace is coming to the rescue shipping one he has to me!
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| Gaffer Tim Pace |
Tim was the Gaffer on TOTD, and actually gave me my first pro prop job building a futuristic mail-contest-drum for Dick Dyszel's "Captain 20" kids TV show on WDCA TV20 in Washington DC.
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| Tim Pace, and I, at Channel 20, with our mail drum for Captain 20, February 1978 |
Tim has helped many times over with TOTD, from loaning equipment, helping with sound effects and pro-video, and he is owed a debt of gratitude for his kindness and dedication to TWILIGHT OF THE DOGS!
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There WILL be a soundtrack CD, with the terrific score by Mac Squier and end titles song by Joan Burton. Just an FYI, more details coming up!
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Cast and crew that we in some cases haven't heard from in over two decades are starting to show up. Recently we have been delighted to hear from Casting Director Joan Clark Schnitzer; Stephanie Clark (Melody); Line Producer/1st Assistabt Director Zaneta McGaha; and Director Of Photography Alicia Craft. I'm so glad to be in touch with all of them, and am hoping that more of the missing will turn up.
If you know any other cast or crew from TOTD, please put them in touch, I'd like to hear from them!
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