Once again, the True/False Film Fest was an amazing weekend for everyone.  And for us here at Boxcar, it represented a chance to truly challenge ourselves again this year.  First of all, in January we complete the TV spot for the festival which aired around central Missouri during the month of February.  The concept for the commercial came from the timelapse tilt-shift videos of Keith Loutit and others.  We created the video using a Canon 5D Mark II camera with a normal lens and the tilt-shift affect was added using After Effects (as was the giant hand and magnifying glass).  We used a song by our friends Capybara and the finished spot came out great.

Click here to view the embedded video.

During the festival we wanted to create something similar to last year’s Thank You video, but we had the idea to finish the video before 7pm on Sunday so that it could screen in the Missouri Theatre before the closing night film of the festival, which was Lixin Fan’s “Last Train Home.” Jonny Pez only slept for 2 hours on Saturday night on a couch in the edit room, but we pulled it off. At the theatre that night several festival staff told us that this video reminded them why they work so hard to create this amazing film festival every year. The video is now on the True/False website as well as our own. For this video we mixed the tilt-shift concept from the commercial with the montage idea from our Thank You video to create something that we hope captures the essence of True/False 2010.

Click here to view the embedded video.

Our friend Nathan Truesdell and the team at Arable Entertainment created the bumpers this year, which turned out great.  The bumper was shot on the RED camera and was screened before all of the films during the festival.  Nate has created the bumpers for the past several years, but the bumper is the most ambitious and entertaining one I’ve seen so far.

Click here to view the embedded video.

We’ve recently begun using Google Alerts to notify us when Boxcar Films or “Box Elder” is mentioned in the press. One of the first articles we found a few weeks ago was in the local paper here in Columbia about a project we just finished with Warren Dalton and David James. We created a DVD to accompany their new book, called “Historic Downtown Columbia.” The photo above is of the original courthouse in Columbia and is taken from the book. This article in the Columbia Daily Tribune explains the project.  If you’re in Columbia, copies of the book/DVD can be ordered at the Missouri Theatre box office.

A recent result for “Box Elder” brought up this article on the site of the Gene Siskel Art Center in Chicago. Range Life Entertainment was recently in Chicago screening several comedies as part of their Fall Tour ‘09. The new Range Life Spring Tour will kick off in March and will take several films, including “Box Elder,” to cities on the east coast.  We also found this review of the film, written recently in The Maneater (Mizzou’s campus newspaper).

Finally, a funny result came up for Todd Sklar (writer/director of “Box Elder”) in Matt Dentler’s blog, top 10 whatever of ‘09. Matt (from Cinetic Media), wanted to break the mold, and instead of creating a “top 10 films of the year,” he put together a list of “top 10 anything else.” Todd submitted a list of his top 10 sandwiches of 2009, and you can check them out on Matt’s blog.

As the decade comes to a close, we have quite a bit going on here at Boxcar Films.  This month we find ourselves prepping to shoot a TV commercial for the True/False Film Fest, as well as making plans for several projects that are coming up in the spring.  We are also wrapping up the projects that we spent the last part of 2009 working on and you can see several recently-finished videos up on our site now.

For example, we just finished a promotional video for a new line of fishing rods by Wright & McGill.  Last month we completed a :30 TV spot that we shot at the same time (back in October), and you can read about the project and view the :30 spot in our last blog post.  But this promotional video is now complete and will play in stores around the country as a point-of-sale video.

Click here to view the embedded video.

We also just released a music video for the band Ghost In The Machine.  The video was filmed in 2008 during the Stephens College Summer Film Institute, but the band had several delays in finishing their new album, so we’ve waiting to release the music video until now.  The song is called “Never Trust a Pirate,” and we had a blast putting it together.  We created elaborate sets and dozens of sock puppets and filmed for 3 days in Studio B on the Stephens College campus.  We’re all really proud of the final product, particularly because it has received praise from such a wide range of people, from grandparents to kids to G.I.T.M.’s loyal hardcore fan base.  It walks a fine line between light and dark humor and provides a nice contrast to the music.  The new album should be out soon, and the music video will launch on youtube in the next couple of weeks, but in the meantime you can watch it here:

Click here to view the embedded video.

This month we will have a lot more news regarding Box Elder, True/False, a new Boxcar Commercial Reel and more.  But for now we’d simply like to wish all of you a Happy New Year.  Bring on the 2010.