Has it been 3 months since my last update? I’ve never been good at this blogging thing, but I’m gonna work at getting better at it. The latest on the Xterminating Angel Films front is that I’ll be producing a couple of exciting videos for Baltimore street artist XXsist, who’s embarking on an ambitious mural project this summer. We’ll be shooting a Kickstarter campaign intro video this weekend, and if the campaign’s succesful, we’ll be shooting a time-lapse video of the creation of the mural much later this summer. I’m very excited to be helping a fellow Baltimore artist realize his vision.

‘Anatomy Of A Dog’ is still happening, not to worry. I became bogged down with the production of a small commercial project, but I’ve decided to place that aside and concentrate on both ‘Anatomy’ and the XXsist video. After much soulsearching, I’ve decided to continue to produce smaller projects on the path to ‘Anatomy’ later this year, as I make a major push to grow as an independent film producer in the MD/DC/VA area. Wish me luck!

And let me not wait another three months to make a post.

Here are three shorts that caught my eye as examples of filmmakers in command of their craft but producing on a relative low budget. Thanks to Bob Rose for pointing these out to me. First of all, here’s an award-winning horror-comedy short by Bill Palmer, ‘The Living Want Me Dead’, winner of multiple awards including the New York City Horror Film Festival. We see a young man being chased by raving zombies. When he makes his way to his friend’s house, we find out how this came to pass. Palmer’s short is sharp. Cleverly written and superbly executed. Note the accomplished HD cinematography; fast editing; solid soundtrack and sound effects; and just the attention to cinematic detail. This is also an example of the wonders you can make with Adobe After Effects. Many filmmakers are making Hollywood-quality shorts by mastering this and other related programs. This short didn’t cost much but it looks like it did. This level of accomplishment is what makes Hollywood producers and studios take notice.

The Living Want Me Dead – Full Short Film from Bill Palmer on Vimeo.

Filmmaker Clinton Jones also demonstrates master of visual compositing in ‘Cardboard Warfare 2′, a WWII-themed short that looks and sounds on par with HBO’s ‘Band Of Brother’s mini-series.. for the exception that all props in Jones’ film are made of cardboard. Look at the airplane sequence in the beginning. Cardboard airplanes flying compellingly to drop the protagonists on enemy territory. Those are the wonders of After Effects. The rest of the film demonstrates such command of cinematic craft I wouldn’t be surprised if this filmmaker landed a Hollywood deal right after making it. His actors are young.. but it’s so well put together that after a good while, you just forget you’re watching kids playing with cardboard.

Lastly, filmmaker Freddie Wong has made a name for himself on Youtube by creating impressive comedy-action shorts with seemingly no effort. His shorts routinely get millions of hits on Youtube and in time caught the attention of big-time Hollywood. Here’s one he made with Jon Favreau (dir. ‘Iron Man’ and its sequel), who invited Wong into his set for ‘Cowboys And Aliens’ and gave him free reign to do as he wished. Again, look at the mastery of visual compositing.

These examples aren’t suggestions that one must become a wizard of After Effects to make great shorts, but just a note of what the program can do and how it allows low-budget filmmakers to raise their level of craft considerably. After all, the best elements of filmmaking are primarily story, character, dialogue, good cinematography and sound. If you can bring great visual effects to the table, more power to you.

It’s 2012. Where am I with my personal indie filmmaking? I’ve not posted an update for a good long while. It’s about time for one. I’m still very determined to continue making films, so consider this my first burst in moving forward.

But first, an update on some previous projects and just loose ends that must tied up: I pulled the plug on my horror film review site Horror-101.com in December 2010 after coming to the protracted realization that I didn’t want to be someone who wrote about films; I want to be the one who makes them. This is who I always wanted to be, and the site, though it became successful, was taking me away from that mission. I thought I could work both sides of the fence and be both film reviewer and filmmaker; unfortunately, such a thing is just not possible. Horror-101.com had a great run, and–who knows–it might return in some form in the future. Let me take a moment and give big thanks to Alex DiVincenzo, my co-writer at Horror-101.com, for all the great work he did for four and a half years. Someone needs to hire that boy and give him a full film site to edit.

There will be a director’s cut of ‘How To Train A Mean Girl’s Ass’, my last completed short shot back in July 2011, in 2012. The film needs a bit of ADR and some reshoots. But even if I can’t get to do that, the cut as is will make an appearance here this year. In regards to the major casting call we held at the Creative Alliance back in October 2011–very unfortunately, the short films that were to be produced fell thru. My production partner decided to move to Los Angeles so his wife could go to Editing school (Best of luck, Chris and Kelly!). The proposed comedy shorts had to be put permanently on hold. Such is life. The good news is that I’ve set forth towards new projects.

I’ve started serious development of my first indie feature length film. And I put the stress on the word ’serious’. It will be a horror film and, with good luck and diligence, I should be shooting by late this year or by this time next year. Why the long wait until the shoot? Well, I must confess that I’m writing it. And I will be then undertaking funding this summer. So, regardless of whenever it will shoot, the point is that I’ve started to seriously head towards that goal after 7 years of making independent short films.

The film I propose to do is the feature length story that follows my short ‘The Waterboard’. It’s currently titled ‘Anatomy Of A Dog’. I won’t go into more details as I’m about to go into a creative cocoon in the next couple of months and I don’t want to publicly talk the film to death. But I hope to create a remarkable, artsy, relevant, character-driven indie horror feature film to present to you in a couple of years.

My slow climb towards the peak of my personal Mt. Everest (as Quentin Tarantino referred to the task of making a feature film) continues. Making this film by the time I’m 40 (I’m currently 38) is a major goal for me. After 7 years of hard-earned preparation by making 6 short films, finishing a film school degree, and participating in countless other film projects, I feel I’m ready for the task.

I plan on reaching this peak in an organic, paceful manner. I’ve several major obstacles still in my way, including a dayjob with the federal government that vastly drains my creativity and life stamina. I’m determined to not let my situation deter me from making this film. I’ve come this far. This is my life pursuit and I feel confident that I have the ability to continue and eventually succeed.

As a mean to keep myself motivated, I will begin to post more here–not only updates on the feature–but film reviews, discussion of indie film news, the posting of all my previous short films, as well as posting shorts from others who’ve caught my eye.

What I’ve slowly come to realize is that in an indie film production environment that’s still undergoing a troubling recession, I must be the engine of motivation to make films worth a damn. No one else will do this for me. And my observation is that the vast majority of online discussion of film, be them on any site, Twitter, Facebook, or other online venue, is aimed at the publicizing of already finished film projects that have garnered film festival slots, awards, and eventual distribution. There are not many places to go online to talk to other struggling indie filmmakers and stay motivated. Let this blog become that place. Let this blog gain some gravity and motivate others to make their films.

And let’s see if I can make ‘Anatomy Of A Dog’ and finally show to you a vision that has been inside my head for over 15 years. Here’s to a productive, motivated, disciplined, and accomplished 2012 for my filmmaking.

Today is a great day! It’s my birthday–my 38th–and I’m fully enjoying my day. Things lately have been going very well. I can say that I’ve been happy. And, like a good Buddhist, I want to make you happy by sharing cool things with you.

Here’s my new film, ‘How To Train A Mean Girl’s Ass’. In all the excitement of its premiere at the 29 Days Later Film Project last Wednesday at the Creative Alliance Patterson Theater, I forgot to post it here. This is the short cut of the film made for the competition but I intend to finish a director’s cut in the weeks ahead, as there was so much funny stuff left in the cutting room that it was just criminal.

Also, I want to remind everyone that we have a big, big open casting call for comedy films on Wednesday, August 31st, 6pm to 9pm, also at the Creative Alliance Patterson Theater. See the post below for details. Please tell all your actor friends!

I’m feeling revitalized and liberated after making this new short film. And I fully intend to make more: Horror, comedy, drama and more. Stay tuned!

How To Train A Mean Girl’s Ass from ArmandoValle on Vimeo.

Folks, lots of stuff happening with Xterminating Angel Films this month. The new comedy film ‘How To Train A Mean Girl’s Ass’ debuts at the 29 Days Later Project screening this Wednesday night (Aug 17th) at 7pm. Please come to the Creative Alliance Patterson Theater in Baltimore (3134 Eastern Avenue, Baltimore MD) to check it out as well as other exciting indie film shorts.

We’ll be holding another open casting call for comedy and acting talent on August 31st, in partnership with Bad Intentions, Dire Wit Films and Level 17 Films. If you’re a DMV area actor or actress looking for an opportunity to break into indie film, this is your chance! The call will take place also at the Creative Alliance Patterson Theater, again on Wed, Aug 31st, from 6pm to 9pm. Please bring your headshot resume. For more info, email me at info@xterminatingangel.com.

There’s more! We’re working on a TV commercial that we expect will be broadcast in the Baltimore area in the coming months. And here’s a treat for you: Thanks to filmmaker Tommy Duncan, you get to take an early look at ‘How To Train A Mean Girl’s Ass’ with this Behind-The-Scenes video. Check it out and see how I roll on set!

Before you go onto the video, just a quick shot-out to my good friend Erik Kristopher Myers, whose dramatic, intense feature film ‘Roulette’ screens at the World Music and Independent Film Festival in Washington, DC tonight at 7pm. For more info, go to wmiff.com. If you’re reading this in time, come on down. I’ll be there!

It’s been a while, hasn’t it? It’s amazing how time flies and how the currents of life take you away from projects and in new unsuspected directions. Never meant for 10 months to go by before making another post or further developing this site. For those who want to know what happened, here’s the short version: My life took a detour. I lost my way and focus. But now, I’m regaining them. So…where were we?

I’m currently editing a new comedy short tentatively codenamed ‘Celeb Sex’. It’s my first film in a little over a year. And I’m quite excited to be sharing it with you soon. In August. Look forward to a link here.

I’ve also partnered with two friends from Philadelphia, and together we’re forming a production shingle called Bad Intentions Pictures. Our aim is to shoot a series of comedy shorts in the coming months at locations in Philadelphia and Baltimore. What the shorts have in common are intrinsic subversive ideas. These shorts will ‘push the envelope’ with edgy content, absurd concepts and a more accomplished visual style. So to speak, these shorts have.. ‘bad intentions’.

I also hope to post all my shorts to date here in the coming months and to complete my vision for this site as home to my work and launching pad to future projects. So.. that’s where I am? And, oh, I really got to go back to cracking on that feature length horror film script. Wish me luck.

Sincerely,
Armando Valle

edited to add: At this time, Horror-101.com has gone to the great website heaven in the cyber sky. We stopped updating in December 2010. Alex went onto write news for ArrowInTheHead, another horror film site. I want to concentrate on filmmaking. The site is now archived. It might return, but for the time being, it’s just resting and pining for the fields.

Hola! It’s been close to a month since I put up the preview version of the new site. So where do we stand? As usual, life found a way to get in the way of the work. Currently, I must work on a Horror-101.com sponsored screening of Mondo Baltimore taking place on Oct 7th. Really wanting to finish this site, as finishing opens the door for me to work on my next serious film project. Stay tuned!

Here’s a preview of my new site, XterminatingAngel.com. Things aren’t 100% yet. Don ‘t even think about clicking on the banner links, as they’re not functional yet. There are no other categories or posts yet, but here’s my ‘Hipsturbia’ film clip just to test the layout. I promised myself I would have it by the morning of Aug 20th, so here it is. It’s about 70% done, really, so I plan on coming back next week and finishing all that remains to be done. How are you liking it? Oh, you can’t leave comments below yet.. so any feedback just email me at armandovalle@gmail.com.

Hipsturbia from ArmandoValle on Vimeo.