Blog 3: Cliff, Tiff

I don’t even know where to start with this blog… how about…

We almost died…

We started our day at 6 AM. I woke up at 4:30 AM, just to get everything ready for the shoot. We were filming at this national park called “Mission Trails.” It is in San Diego and it is supposed to be our own little Safari Zone. What a hot day too! Practically everyone got sunburnt to the next degree and most of us almost passed out from the shortage of water we had! We felt like Moltres was following us all day!

We were far into the wilderness… with barely any supplies… oh wait… we had a one hundred dollar rental 12 x 12 film stand that we had to carry around. Super heavy, takes multiple people to set up. But it was definitely worth it. The stand helps block light which will make things look a lot better! It will show in the final product.

At lunch time, we got pizza for everyone. Only a few hours had passed, and already the tension was high. The Pidgeottos hovered above us… circling over our weak bodies… they wanted to kill us. The thought of seeing an Arbok out in the wild… it still frightens me today. We kept filming and filming, until about 4 PM. That’s when things got interesting.

At 4 PM, Officer Jenny came to film with us. We got the shots set up, memorized our lines, used Repel to ward off any wild Pokemon and we were about to film when… the battery dies.

So now, someone has to go to Starbucks to charge the battery… but wait, the sun is going down too, so we have to switch locations to handle nature. MOTHER NATURE, WHY HAVE YOU FORSAKEN US.

We packed up all of our supplies, which alone took about an hour and became a back and forth game of handling heavy supplies. We had everything loaded into a car and were ready to go. Being tired and heat deprived while having an allergy attack (an attack that made coughing every second a “fun” thing to do,) I put the car in reverse by accident and hit the pedal.

You see. This would have been totally fine.

If the car wasn’t on a cliff.

We started to go down the cliff. As we were all screaming, I put the car in park and squeezed on the emergency break. Almost instantly, everyone got out of the car to push the car back towards the road. I step on the gas, the wheels spin and spin, we aren’t moving…  we are stuck…

I hit the gas again, everyone else pushing behind me. We’re tired. Sleep deprived. Sun burnt. Scared. BUT! Sure enough, the car gets out of the ditch. We continue on to the next location without a second thought because even if we nearly died… we were still racing the sun… and we needed that last shot.

(It doesn’t look nearly as bad as it was, trust us.)

30 seconds into the ride to the next location, we were all laughing, happy to have our lives.

We filmed the last scene in the next location, got all the shots before the sun failed us… and in the end… we did it!

Everything was against us. But, both Ho-Oh and Lugia were keeping their eyes out for us on that fateful day…

Wish us luck Pokemon Friends. We will catch them all… all the shots…

Till next time -
Austin “Brock” Stevenson

Hey guys, Austin Stevenson (Brock) here!

What a day.

I am both tired and sun burnt. Signs of a good shoot? I think so.

We filmed at a beach for six hours and then went to a hiking place to film another scene. We didn’t finish everything, but we got some really epic and awesome shots!

Daen Olson (Professor Oak) got even more sun burnt then me. It might have something to do with the fact that he had a “filming reflector” (helps light a scene) in his face for about 30 minutes. We started filming at 7 AM and we finished up at 8 PM.

In other news, today, we got to work with a new actress, Andrea Bensussen. She will be playing the role of “Officer Jenny.” She did such a great job and had a great attitude during today’s shoot. I mean, she had to get dressed in a Porta-Potty filled with flies (not the HM)! Anyone who can do that and still have a smile on their face? That’s a definite sign of a good person. The Porta-Potty smelled worse than a Grimer and Muk combined and we wouldn’t be surprised if those two were floating around in there. Disgusting!

We also worked with a new kid named Dan today. He was a lot of help and made things go a little faster.

At lunch, we had Subway! I had tuna! YUM.

Overall, we had a fun day of great shots and new people. We were very productive but due to natural lighting failing us (dang it, nature,) it started to not look so good.

We will be filming some more shots this Wednesday and then, we will spend all Friday filming a scene. Once those are wrapped up, that will be it for filming Episode 1! From there, it will be one or two weeks until it is posted and you guys can check it out!

Thanks for everything guys, the crew and I really appreciate the early love!

Your friendly neighborhood Pokemon Catcher,

Brock

GOOOO PIKACHU!

USE FILMING YOUTUBE SERIES ATTACK!

What a day—-

Our first day of shooting was the first time we got to work with Victor Bareno. Let me tell you, this man is a genius and the quality of the film will blow you away. Now, you will finally see Brock and Professor Oak the way you’ve always wanted to see them. I took on the task of writing the scripts and, in my humble opinion, it was hilarious. And I don’t think anything is funny. Daen Olson (Prof. Oak) and I (Brock), have been best friends for so long and have acted in fun things for so many years that we work off each other very well. Something we hope you’ll see in the finished product.

To start the day, we had the privilege of filming in a sushi restaurant which was great! The food was tasty and the place looked awesome. But when we went three hours over our initial promise, they were getting ready to take out their samurai swords and kill us “Hara-kiri” style. In the end, it all worked out. Here are a few shots of the set.

We then went to a grocery store to film, which was a great experience. Well, it was great all up to the point when Victor knocked over BBQ sauce, Tapatio, and salad dressing bottles with his camera rig, causing all of them to spill to the ground. Luckily, the manager didn’t see and Victor got that new BBQ shirt that he always wanted for Christmas.

The manager was cool and said we can come back anytime, so hopefully we can film more things in there.

It was great how it all worked out. Everyone worked really hard, there were tons of laughs and despite a few spills and glares, we got through the day unscathed. We spent 15 hours filming and we were exhausted… but we still managed to go home and play Pokemon until 3 AM… addiction!

Well thanks for reading the blog, hope you watch and love it just like Stupid Mario Brothers! Tell your friends, even the smelly ones! Thanks guys!

P.S.

We would not do this without all you fans. I’m serious! Add us on Facebook, we are the coolest guys. Add Daen Olson and Austin Stevenson.