As we had been planning the first shoot, I knew one thing that had to be started early and figured out as quickly as possible was the construction of the two monster costumes.
Since the idea from inception was inspired by the Power Rangers, and that by proxy was the child of Godzilla, I wanted to eschew the conventional CGI monster claptrap shit I had seen in countless crappy monster movies and put stuntmen in suits and have them duke it out old school. It was more fun that way and also presented a unique and interesting challenge.
I discovered, however, that almost nobody creates those things anymore. I should have known better because when I got my start it was at a VFX company in the Presidio, just across the street from the company that started it all, Industrial Light and Magic. Even they no longer had their famous creature department. It was all computers. Costume makers were dinosaurs.
I considered everything. Nothing was off the table. I had phone calls with traditional cloth costume people who told me that kind of thing was out of their ability. I had wonderful midday lunches with enthusiastic art students who valiantly attempted to figure it out only to tell me they too were unable to make such a thing I was requesting. I reached out to video game cosplayers, but out of the few I could get ahold of, they all sadly informed me that their creations wouldn’t be able to hold together in any high action environment.
Finally I found some dyed-in-the-wool creature effects people and I learned something fascinating.
First, let me explain that in film, the craft you practice somehow comes to affect your psyche. Maybe subconsciously or maybe it’s what drew you to it in the first place, but if you’re a grip you tend be laconic, dry and will seize every opportunity to smoke when you’re not needed. If you’re in the camera department, you’re super god damn hip, a real slick hollywood character and you fucking know it. If you’re a stuntman, you know you are a badass but you pretend you’re ten times more badass than that and you will excitedly do any stunt in a put-me-in-coach-I-can-do-it-baby kind of way.
If you’re a creature effects costume person, you’re a wild eyed lunatic howling at the moon the top of a mountain of old Phantasmagoria magazines and Star Trek slash fiction.
I only met a few in the Bay Area. Some didn’t want to touch my little movie. Some would do it but only for more money than I had ever had in my life. Others would do it but had so many red flags I felt like I was on a first date I found on Craigslist. It was a total bummer.
Oh shit: I wish this didn’t happen.
I had no idea how to title this section but this is all I could think of because it’s the God’s honest truth. I’ll make it quick.
A close friend and artistic peer of mine that had introduced me to Scary Cow had heard of my plight in finding a costume artist. With limited experience in costume making, but what I perceived to be a skilled and competent artistic background, we came to terms that she would take on the project for a fee of $9,000 to be paid in three parts. That is a lot of money and since I was privately financing the film by working my regular gigs, splitting it up helped me keep funding the other parts of the film without starving to death. 3k on signing, 3k on delivery and 3k on completion of the film, or so I thought. But hey, costumes were in production and I could return my focus to the other scenes of the film! Huzzah! (fuck)
We’ll come back to this soon.
