Who Likes Short Shorts?

Festivals, that’s who. Elder Sign, specifically. We are proud to announce the our film will appear in nine festivals this fall. We don’t have time slots for all fests but we will update as information becomes available. In the meantime, try and check out a festival and support you local genre films!

- Fantastic Fest, Friday, September 25, at 11:59 PM, and Wednesday, September 30, at 9:30 PM. Both screenings are with Jake West’s “Doghouse”

- ShockerFest International Film Festival, Saturday, September 26, at 12:30 PM

- The H.P. Lovecraft Film Festival and Cthulhu Con, October 2, 3, 4, 2009, Hollywood Theatre, Portland Oregon

- The Eerie Horror Fest, October 8 to 11

- The International Horror and Sci-Fi Film Festival, October 15 to 18

- The Terror Film Festival, Friday, October 23, at 1:30 PM

- The Sacramento Horror Film Festival, SUNDAY, OCTOBER 25TH, at 3 PM

- The Spooky Movie 2009, SUNDAY, OCTOBER 25, CINEMA ARTS THEATRE (FAIRFAX), 12:30 PM

- The Horror UK 28 Hours Later Halloween Film Festival, Saturday, October 31, at 6:20 PM

Filed under: Elder Sign, Festivals, abdul alhazred, al azif, call of cthulhu, Elder Sign, fishmen, flying polyps, great race of yith, horror, hp lovecraft, hp lovecraft film festival, innsmouth, Joseph Nanni, old ones, short film

Necronomicon Spells Trouble

Last week we finished shooting the third HPL inspired short in our unholy trinity.  A good time was has by all and the Necronomicon was refined and polished (the prop that is)  Let’s call it a dry run for its feature film debut.

The short should be finished in a couple of weeks and then it’s off to the internets.  And that’s it for our short films.  But as the days get shorter the films get longer as we begin production on our first feature Drawing Baphomet.

Keep on Ftaghn,

Joseph Nanni

Jim offers some friendly advice.

The big bad book changes hands.

Dan holds 'the book' heavy with forbidden knowledge.

Filed under: Production, abdul alhazred, al azif, call of cthulhu, Elder Sign, fishmen, flying polyps, great race of yith, hp lovecraft, hp lovecraft film festival, innsmouth, Joseph Nanni, Necronomicon, old ones, short film, yog sothoth

The LNN Interview

The good people at the Lovecraft News Network interviewed me HERE! All I can say is of all the news networks out there, LNN is the most fair and balanced. What is the LNN, you ask? Well they are this:

What is the LNN?

• Do you have a preternatural interest in cephalopods?
• Do you ever lay awake at night dreaming of ways to introduce the word “cyclopean” into everyday speech?
• Have you ever looked up 47° 9′ 0″ S, 126° 43′ 0″ W on Google Maps?
• Do you know what the Cup of the Ptolemies was carven out of?
• Do you know that the most merciful thing in the world is the inability of the human mind to correlate all its contents?

If you answered “yes” to any of these questions, then you are probably just like us here at theLovecraft News Network. Forget earthly politics, celebrities, and hope. This is your source for news that really matters. Enjoy!

Filed under: Love to Lovecraft, call of cthulhu, comedy, etsy, fishmen, flying polyps, great race of yith, horror, hp lovecraft, hp lovecraft film festival, Joseph Nanni, old ones, yog sothoth

We’re In Fantasia . . . The Film Festival!

Fantasia is the name of a lot of things.  It is also the name of North America’s premire genre festival – their website says so.  And we are very excited to announce that Elder Sign will be having its North American big screen premire at this year’s show.  The work that shows at Fantasia is the very kind of stuff that inspires us to make shorts like Elder Sign, and plus I was born in Montreal.  We’ll get back to you with the dates.

Joseph Nanni

Filed under: Elder Sign, Festivals, Elder Sign, Fantasia, fishmen, flying polyps, great race of yith, horror, hp lovecraft, hp lovecraft film festival, imdb, innsmouth, Joseph Nanni, old ones, short film, yog sothoth

Casting Call of Cthulhu Calls Continue

If you find yourself in Uruguay from May 15 to 22 the check out Montevideo Fantastico. The Festival is the only event in Uruguay specialized in horror, sci-fi, fantastic and bizarre films. Its objective is to divulge once a year independent and generally low budget productions that are frequently considered as part of a “minor genre” and who almost never have accesss to commercial and even cultural circuits.  And Casting Call of Cthulhu will be there.  We still got it.

Filed under: Festivals, call of cthulhu, comedy, darkest of the hillside thickets, Elder Sign, fishmen, flying polyps, great race of yith, Joseph Nanni, old ones, short film, yog sothoth

Packaging The Madness

Short Film Festival season is here again and this time out we’ve descended all the way into madness by printing, cutting, assembling, and hand-finishing some 100 plus pieces, each requiring 60 steps to complete. We assume that the average festival in-box is filled with a multitude of hard mailers and bubble-lined manilla envelopes which are torn open an emptied at random and the contents ranked, filed and cued for review. Unhappy to just add to the heap we decided to do something different, after all, we sacrifice our heart, soul, and mind for our work so to just put it in a jewel case and drop it in the post seems like its own brand of insanity. So we constructed 50 pieces for submission and another 50 to offer to our fans which will help cover the production cost and festival fees. This is really about the packaging as both films are available all over the internet in high quality.  Regardless, the DVD features Elder Sign (2 min 14) and Casting Call of Cthulhu (9 min 12).
We were inspired by a voice from beyond the stars and outside reason . . . and the Farrow design for Spiritualized’ Ladies and Gentlemen We Are Floating In Space, a brilliant album, brilliantly packaged.
The package was designed by Art Director Gints Bruveris and assembled by Joseph Nanni as follows:

First, each box flat is cut from a single 11×17 sheet, which has to be individually fed into the printer ’cause it is 100 lb paper.  Each piece has 26 cuts.

The box flat is then scored.  Each piece has 14 folds.

The scored box is then assembled with a single piece of two-sided tape.  Simples!

The inner sleeve is then cut from a piece of heavy tracing paper which looks and feels just like Band-Aid packaging. There are four cuts.

The inner sleeve is then folded.

The pill design label is placed on the DVD.

Each DVD has to have a tracking number.  This is hand written as each show has a different code.

The DVD is then sealed in the sleeve with three pieces of two sided tape for that “sterile” look and feel.

The sealed sleeve is dropped in the box and presto . . .

. . . packaging magic!

Finally, the piece is dropped in the mail and into the hands of the gods . . . where it WILL be judged.

If you are interested in owning one click here.  The package costs $15.00 and features both Elder Sign and Casting Call of Cthulhu.

Filed under: Elder Sign, Festivals, Products, call of cthulhu, Elder Sign, etsy, fishmen, flying polyps, great race of yith, horror, hp lovecraft, hp lovecraft film festival, old ones, short film, yog sothoth

Support Elder Sign And CCOC In Style

Cover your weak flesh and celebrate the shorts you love with a sharp new shirt designed by Spacecadet Design and produced by Uptown Hustle Apparel. These nifty all-cotton T’s in various colours and styles may actually help attract evil. Each shirt bears the ancient symbol or “logo” from the film poster created by Spacecadet using non-euclidean geometrical shapes, which draw viewers in unknowingly.  Every dollar goes right back into our productions, and helps pay for the ones we’ve already done.  Buy now, quantities are unlimited.  

Visit our shop today!

Filed under: Products, animation, call of cthulhu, CGI, comedy, darkest of the hillside thickets, fishmen, great race of yith, horror, hp lovecraft, innsmouth, latex, old ones, Prosthetics, short film, yog sothoth

It’s A Bird, It’s A Plane, It’s A Half Polypous, Utterly Alien Entity

Producing Casting Call of Cthulhu failed to provoke insanity, although watching  it drove a few people crazy, and the Bad Advice for Good Times crew lived to film again.  The new short was colour transferred just yesterday and sound post will finish next week.  But be forewarned – there is no escaping madness this time around.  To prepare you for what is to come we offer here a small, untextured, uncoloured sample of the horror that awaits you.  Warning:  The final character will be only partly material and you may experience temporary lapses of visibility.  

 

Filed under: Elder Sign, animation, black metal, brian lumley, call of cthulhu, CGI, comedy, darkest of the hillside thickets, doug bradley animation, dragon con, Elder Sign, fishmen, flying polyps, great race of yith, guillermo del toro, hellboy, horror, hp lovecraft, innsmouth, john coulthart, latex, lovecraft: fear of the unknown, mike mignola, old ones, paul carrick, Prosthetics, short film, st joshi, yog sothoth

First of Three New HPL Films Now In Post-Production

In October, Bad Advice for Good Times announced that Joseph Nanni (Casting Call of Cthulhu) would be following up the success of his freshman effort with a new short.  He wasn’t fhtagn around.  Filming finished late last Monday, the rough-cut is in the can, and the footage is now in the hands of 4 Stroke animation who will be realizing another HPL inspired beastie with the same awesomeness they brought to the Great Race.  The short was shot with Red Camera by D.P. Ray Dumas.  Nanni says, “the film is funni-er than the one other film I have done.”

Keep watching this space for more news.  Rumour is the trailer for Drawing Baphomet is also finished.  The stars are right in 2009!

Filed under: CGI, Elder Sign, Love to Lovecraft, Production, animation, brian lumley, call of cthulhu, CGI, comedy, cradle of filth, darkest of the hillside thickets, doug bradley, dragon con, Elder Sign, fishmen, flying polyps, GANGRENE, great race of yith, guillermo del toro, hellboy, horror, hp lovecraft, innsmouth, john coulthart, latex, lovecraft: fear of the unknown, mike mignola, old ones, Prosthetics, short film, st joshi, yog sothoth

I Can Haz Amberg Horror Fest?

If you live in Europe and you love Casting Call of Cthulhu then we have a hard time believing you because the film has yet to be shown in Europe.  CCoC will have its European premiere at the Amberg Horror Festival, OKT 28 to NOV 2.  So go see it and then say you love it.  You don’t have to lie to impress us – we like you for who you are.  Oh wait, the film is on the Internet, and Yog Sothoth, and Youtube, and thousands of Europeans have already seen it.  Awkward.  We’re sorry.  Look, things have been stressful at work and sometimes we just forget who we’re talking to.  How ’bout this, Friday we’ll go for dinner and catch a movie, just us?

Filed under: Festivals, animation, black metal, brian lumley, call of cthulhu, CGI, comedy, cradle of filth, darkest of the hillside thickets, doug bradley, dragon con, fishmen, great race of yith, guillermo del toro, hellboy, horror, hp lovecraft, innsmouth, john coulthart, latex, lovecraft: fear of the unknown, mike mignola, old ones, paul carrick, Prosthetics, short film, st joshi, yog sothoth