Hello all! I'm here in Las Vegas right now on Sunday morning. This is stage #1 of the western filming. But more on that later! Right now I'm going to talk about what we did in NYC right before we jumped on the plane and headed out here.
On Friday evening, I got together with Candy Pain, Lance, and VeVe to film our last official NYC shoot with Candy. If you hadn't heard, Candy is moving out to Los Angeles at the end of May. We're sad to see her go! However, VeVe had quite a number of ideas for filming with Candy before her move...
The Blade Runner scene.
Candy is a former gymnast, and though she has often practiced back handsprings between videos at our shoots, we had yet to get her acrobatic action on film. So, hold this thought for a moment.
Now, some of you may recall VeVe's special request Mrs. Fothergill Modesty Blaise scene recreation from last summer. This was the scene where Mrs. Fothergill deals with her "new toy," who happens to be a mime. In our version, the mime was played by Twiggy.
Anyway, in response to this scene recreation, a viewer suggested a scene recreation from the movie Blade Runner. That'd be the scene where the protagonist Deckard "fights" the acrobatic replicant Pris. This scene is similar to the Mrs Fothergill scene in that they both involved standing head scissors with all kinds of close-ups. But the Blade Runner scene was a bit more complex...
After watching the original Blade Runner scene ourselves, we concluded that Candy would be a great choice to play the back-flipping Pris. VeVe had originally deemed Hanz to be the most "Harrison Ford" looking of our ensemble to play Deckard, but since Hanz is still out of town, the role passed the second runner-up: Lance.
And so, we kicked off Friday's long shoot with the most complex piece of the evening... which would actually yield the shortest actual video result (it was just under 3 minutes long). We tried to stay as true to the original as possible, but with one key exception: in our version, Deckard forgot to bring his gun. See for yourselves how that played out!
Here is the original...
And here is our version...
A pretty good warm-up for the shoot!
And here is some "making of" raw footage of Candy's gymnastics action that we used in our scene: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DXDdxw_-kco
Superheroine Transformation!
Candy and Lance then went on to film another video together; this one having a damsel-in-distress turns superheroine theme. The general idea is that Lance is an evil henchman to a crime boss, and he's captured this poor damsel Candy Plain for his boss. He ties her to a chair, gags her, and calls for his boss to come get them. However, Candy tricks him into ungagging her and then says her magic power phrase... changing from lowly Candy Plain into superheroine Candy Pain! She then breaks free and turns the tables on Lance.
I got a chance to use some "old school" transformation tricks to make this one happen, which was a lot of fun. We were going for a vintage Batman TV show feel. Have a look at the transformation segment:
After that, we released Lance to go enjoy his weekend, and then Candy and I took the stage together.
More Crime Fighting for Candy: Scissors Crime Buster!
For our next trick - which was actually the least tricky of all filming this evening - I got myself ready to rob Candy's basement. Well, not really. I mean, I tried. Well, no, I mean I was just looking around, you see...
Candy comes down to her basement looking for some old video tapes when she discovers a burglar poking about. Fearless as always, Candy attacks the burglar and tackles him to the ground. Since she doesn't have any rope or weapons, she decides to hold on to the intruder with some readily accessible assets: her legs!
So, Candy locks me up in a variety of very incapacitating and immobilizing scissors holds as she whips out her cell phone and calls the police. Of course, it takes a little while for the police to arrive, so Candy amuses herself by switching through various scissor positions and also throwing in some grapevines and facesitting pins to further make her point: you just don't mess with Candy Pain's property!
Despite the crushing aspect of the scissors - and Candy does have some powerful legs! - the video was quite fun to make. Candy has a great bubbly-dominant persona, and her dialogue is amusingly witty. I look forward to grabbing some more screen captures from this one. (update: video is now out!)
Body Paint Wrestling
And lastly, we ended the evening with a project that VeVe has been longing to do for some time: body paint wrestling! Of course, the adventurous Candy was very excited to give this a try!
So, VeVe picked up some "classic" blue-and-red wrestling colors from the costume shop, brought in some white sheeting for the mats, and we all got ourselves ready to make some (more) art.
VeVe got painted up in a light-ish blue, ending up looking like some sort of Avatar homage or perhaps even some kind of pixie. Candy painted up in red, looking strikingly like a devil woman. She was especially amused by how the red paint on her face and body make her white teeth so very noticeable.
Behold, here are the ladies as they prepare for the match:
On Friday evening, I got together with Candy Pain, Lance, and VeVe to film our last official NYC shoot with Candy. If you hadn't heard, Candy is moving out to Los Angeles at the end of May. We're sad to see her go! However, VeVe had quite a number of ideas for filming with Candy before her move...
The Blade Runner scene.
Candy is a former gymnast, and though she has often practiced back handsprings between videos at our shoots, we had yet to get her acrobatic action on film. So, hold this thought for a moment.
Now, some of you may recall VeVe's special request Mrs. Fothergill Modesty Blaise scene recreation from last summer. This was the scene where Mrs. Fothergill deals with her "new toy," who happens to be a mime. In our version, the mime was played by Twiggy.
Anyway, in response to this scene recreation, a viewer suggested a scene recreation from the movie Blade Runner. That'd be the scene where the protagonist Deckard "fights" the acrobatic replicant Pris. This scene is similar to the Mrs Fothergill scene in that they both involved standing head scissors with all kinds of close-ups. But the Blade Runner scene was a bit more complex...
After watching the original Blade Runner scene ourselves, we concluded that Candy would be a great choice to play the back-flipping Pris. VeVe had originally deemed Hanz to be the most "Harrison Ford" looking of our ensemble to play Deckard, but since Hanz is still out of town, the role passed the second runner-up: Lance.
And so, we kicked off Friday's long shoot with the most complex piece of the evening... which would actually yield the shortest actual video result (it was just under 3 minutes long). We tried to stay as true to the original as possible, but with one key exception: in our version, Deckard forgot to bring his gun. See for yourselves how that played out!
Here is the original...
And here is our version...
A pretty good warm-up for the shoot!
And here is some "making of" raw footage of Candy's gymnastics action that we used in our scene: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DXDdxw_-kco
Superheroine Transformation!
Candy and Lance then went on to film another video together; this one having a damsel-in-distress turns superheroine theme. The general idea is that Lance is an evil henchman to a crime boss, and he's captured this poor damsel Candy Plain for his boss. He ties her to a chair, gags her, and calls for his boss to come get them. However, Candy tricks him into ungagging her and then says her magic power phrase... changing from lowly Candy Plain into superheroine Candy Pain! She then breaks free and turns the tables on Lance.
I got a chance to use some "old school" transformation tricks to make this one happen, which was a lot of fun. We were going for a vintage Batman TV show feel. Have a look at the transformation segment:
After that, we released Lance to go enjoy his weekend, and then Candy and I took the stage together.
More Crime Fighting for Candy: Scissors Crime Buster!
For our next trick - which was actually the least tricky of all filming this evening - I got myself ready to rob Candy's basement. Well, not really. I mean, I tried. Well, no, I mean I was just looking around, you see...
Candy comes down to her basement looking for some old video tapes when she discovers a burglar poking about. Fearless as always, Candy attacks the burglar and tackles him to the ground. Since she doesn't have any rope or weapons, she decides to hold on to the intruder with some readily accessible assets: her legs!
So, Candy locks me up in a variety of very incapacitating and immobilizing scissors holds as she whips out her cell phone and calls the police. Of course, it takes a little while for the police to arrive, so Candy amuses herself by switching through various scissor positions and also throwing in some grapevines and facesitting pins to further make her point: you just don't mess with Candy Pain's property!
Despite the crushing aspect of the scissors - and Candy does have some powerful legs! - the video was quite fun to make. Candy has a great bubbly-dominant persona, and her dialogue is amusingly witty. I look forward to grabbing some more screen captures from this one. (update: video is now out!)
Body Paint Wrestling
And lastly, we ended the evening with a project that VeVe has been longing to do for some time: body paint wrestling! Of course, the adventurous Candy was very excited to give this a try!
So, VeVe picked up some "classic" blue-and-red wrestling colors from the costume shop, brought in some white sheeting for the mats, and we all got ourselves ready to make some (more) art.
VeVe got painted up in a light-ish blue, ending up looking like some sort of Avatar homage or perhaps even some kind of pixie. Candy painted up in red, looking strikingly like a devil woman. She was especially amused by how the red paint on her face and body make her white teeth so very noticeable.
Behold, here are the ladies as they prepare for the match:
The match itself started out slow and smooth as the ladies tangled and tried to smear their colors on each other. But as they went on, they started ramping up the intensity, until the match became very competitive toward the end. And by that time, both ladies' colors had become rather muddled!
Here they are AFTER the match:
Well!
What a great send-off shoot day for Candy!
It was excellent fun and nicely diverse, most definitely! I look forward to getting these videos all processed once we return from our west coast tour here, but I do think I should be able to grab a few more screen stills from the raw footage (I brought a copy of the raw with me).
We wish Candy all the best in Los Angeles... and, hey, Mistress Kara is in L.A., so many those two ladies can get in contact. Side note: Jason moved to L.A. recently, and we're set to film with him and Mistress Kara while we're there this coming week.
Best wishes to Candy Pain... we hope to film with her again in the future!