It’s a busy week here at For Zombies Productions headquarters. It marks a couple of firsts for us. We’re submitting a movie to the Phoenixville Blobfest Shorty Film completion. We also have an artist’s table at the Philadelphia Wizard World ComicCon this weekend.
We’re nearly a year into making our videos. We’re doing things neither of us thought we would do. If we could travel back 365 days and tell our earlier selves that we would be entering in a film competition and appearing at a comic book convention our past selves would have given our future selves the drubbing they deserved.
Nonetheless, here we are venturing into brave new territory with our production effort and marketing. At the ComicCon we hope to gather more excellent fodder for our Dear Zombies episodes. For those of you just tuning in, Dear Zombies is a series of Dear Abby-style video letters read off on camera to be answered by the zombies. And we give our sage advice as only zombies can. For a few samples, take a look at our Dear Zombies page.
If this year’s Philadelphia ComicCon is like those prior, there will be plenty of people in comic book character outfits. We simply can’t pass up the opportunity to record a Dear Zombies letter from Batman or other various caped crusaders. There’s been a trend over the last few years for ComicCon goers to dress as zombified versions of superheroes. I’m hoping we can get a zombie Spiderman or maybe a zombie Storm Trooper.
We did this once before for Episode One of Dear Zombies with footage from the 2011 New York ComicCon. This time around we’re doing it more professionally with release forms and enticements. Thanks to Sanj’s talented wife, Susan, and her pottery wheel, we have some unique goodies. She produced ceramic fingers and toes that look awfully convincing. Thanks to child labor, the fingernails and toenails are painted and ready to wear. Anyone willing to participate in a Dear Zombies filming is rewarded with a one of these unique and hand-made metacarpals or metatarsals.
Some assembly was required. We made the fingers and toes wearable as a necklace last weekend as we plotted our strategy for the ComicCon. Of course, there was beer involved – both drinking and making. Throughout the afternoon I was putting together my next batch of homebrew: a pale ale that has yet to be named. Maybe you have a suggestion and can leave it in the comments.
If you are in the Philadelphia area and attending Wizard World, please come see us at booth #2358 in Artists’ Alley.
We’ve been to the Phoenixville Blobfest in prior years. A few people in our circle of friends even submitted to the film competition the second year it was running, but this is the first time we’re entering under the For Zombies banner. After much wrangling, we settled on Blobageddon. It is appropriate. The zombies meet with the Blob, end up destroying the world in less than five minutes and have a darn good time doing it.
The star of the show was animated using Blender, a freeware 3D modeling software. We only spent $20 on it for an instructional guide. We spent many hours figuring out how to use it. That was the true cost. For less than five minutes of film, I think we spent thirty hours figuring out how to do the animation. Ultimately, it was worth it. We love how it came out and hope you do, too.
We have no idea how we’ll be received at the ComicCon or at the Blobfest. There’s only one way to find out. We’ll see you on the other side of next week with a full report of the ComicCon. Blobfest will need to wait until later this summer. We’re looking forward to it.